Dissemination result of 2015 national internal migration survey

Vietnam has been undergone a significant transition over the last three decades. Over the last five years, 13.6 percent of the population of Vietnam are migrants. Migrants aged 15 – 59 account for 17.3 percent of which, 19.7 percent are urban migrants, 13.4 are rural.

Approximately 19.7 percent of the urban population are migrants whereas this proportion for rural population is only 13.4 percent. The Southeast region has the highest proportion on the result at 29.3 percent.

These key findings were disseminated at the national workshop on the results of the 2015 national internal migration survey, held in Hanoi by the General Statistics Office (GSO) and the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) in Vietnam.

According to the final result, female migrants make up 17.7 percent of the female population aged 15 – 59. This figure for male migrants is 16.8 percent. The percentage of females among all migrants aged 15 – 59 is 52.4 percent, which confirms the findings on “feminization of migrant” noted in the 2004 survey.

The data also shows that a higher percentage of migrants compared to non-migrants have professional or technical qualification (31.7 percent versus 24.5 percent). Especially, the percentage of migrants who have education at college/university level or higher is 23.1 percent while this figure for non-migrants stands at 17.4 percent.

These differences are partly due to the impact of the younger age structure of the migrant population compared to the non-migrant population. In fact, many young persons migrate in order to access higher educational institutions which are overwhelmingly located in urban areas.

More than 30 percent of migrants sent earnings back to their families within 12 months prior to the survey, with female migrants slightly more likely to remit than were male migrants (30.8 percent versus 29.2 percent).

Although female migrants are more likely than male to send remittances, the total amount of remittance sent by male migrants is higher than that of female. The Southeast, the Red River Delta and Ho Chi Minh City have the highest levels of migrants sending remittances.

According to the survey data, of all difficulties faced by migrants, housing is most often mentioned. Of those reporting difficulties, 42.6 percent of migrants report that they have housing problems. Migrants are more likely to seek support from family members, relatives and friends, rather than the local authorities, organizations and unions in destination areas.

Mr. Nguyen Bich Lam, GSO General Director said: “This survey aimed to collect data information about internal migrant at national level and socio-economics regions, and in the two largest cities of Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City for developing socio-economic development policies, as well as policies and programmes for migrants and providing information to other in-depth survey about migration in Vietnam”.