According to some hard data, we have studied the characteristics of the irregular migration related movements in the European Union. In addition to this, it is important to make an outlook to observe the attributes of international migration in other parts of the world in the same period.
6 Eurostat database, Eurostat 2017.
Africa 19%
Asia 16%
Europe 41%
Latin America and the Carribian
3%
North-America 20%
Oceania 1%
The share of registered asylum applications in the different continents compared to the total number of applications
Africa Asia Europe Latin America and the Carribean North-America Oceania
Figure 4.
The ratio of asylum seekers in the different continents in 2016
Source: Edited by the author based on the data of UNHCR Global Trends 2017. 70
In 2016 two-fifth of the total number of asylum applications were registered in Europe.
Regarding the number of asylum applications, one of the developed continents of the world was ranked second, where the number of registered applications was merely half of those lodged in Europe; in North-America the total number of asylum applications was one-fifth of the total.
These data were generated in terms of absolute numbers and they show that Europe was affected by an extremely high pressure caused by irregular migration in 2016. It is adequate to examine the ratio between the number of registered asylum applications and the level of economic development of the different continents. To describe the correlation between them, the internationally accepted variable is used, which shows the relationship between one asylum applicant and one USD per capita GDP.
280.88
75.57
44.86
10.32 10.35 0.81
0 50 100 150 200 250 300
Africa Asia Europe Latin America and the
Carribean North-America Oceania
Ratio of asylum applicants and one USD per capita GDP
Figure 5.
The ratio between one asylum applicant and one USD per capita GDP in 2016
Source: Edited by the author based on the data of United Nations, National Accounts Main Aggregates Database, 2017
If we take a close look at the ratio of GDP, which stands for the level of economic develop-ment of the continent, to the lodged asylum applications, it is already apparent, that although the highest number of asylum applications was submitted in Europe, taking account of the level of economic development, this high number of asylum applicants did not cause as high a pressure for the continent as the number of applicants in Africa or in Asia. Examining the data of the UN, it is visible that while the number of persons taken under refugee status in Europe was 2.3 million persons, this number was in the economically less developed Africa almost 5.5 million persons.7
Continuing my examination in the field of irregular migration related movements in 2015, and in the years afterwards, it is clear that the number of lodged asylum applications could cause higher pressure for the reception facilities and institutions in other continents of the world than Europe.
Relying on these findings it can be concluded that the high number of asylum applica-tions does not necessarily explain the crisis, because on the one hand, in other less developed parts of the world the number of asylum applications submitted to the responsible authorities was not so high, on the other hand, the situation did not come to a turning point, where there is no possibility for further existence, whereas the whole system would be doomed for destruction in the original meaning of the word crisis. This is totally true in light of the facts that the population of the whole continent was 741 million in 2015, while the population of the European Union was 508.5 million persons in the same year.8
The total per capita GDP was 25,590 USD9 and in the MSs of the European Union the per capita GDP was 25,700 Euro in 2013. The same data are available for Africa, for the continent with the highest number of asylum applicants in comparison to its level of economic development. The total population of Africa was 2 billion while the per capita GDP was 1,914 USD in 2015, it means that compared to the three times higher population figures, the GDP was just one thirteenth of the total GDP produced in Europe.
According to its population and economic power the registration of the yearly 1–1.3 million asylum applicants would not necessarily mean a crisis for the European Union.
Regarding the number of asylum applications submitted in the European Union the data are not reliable because on the one hand, an applicant can lodge several applications in different MSs of the European Union and the figures published by Eurostat are the cu-mulative numbers of the applications – the data of 1.3 million asylum applications indeed show the symptoms of over coverage, on the other hand the majority of asylum applicants probably try to leave the territory of the European Union after the situation normalised in their countries of origin.
Summarizing the above listed facts, the asylum situation in the European Union could hardly be called a crisis because in some other parts of the world the phenomenon of asylum related migration causes bigger pressure for the receiving countries. Due to the fact that the term of migration crisis is not necessarily the right word for the phenomenon caused by the irregular migration in 2015–16, it has to be examined what kind of crisis situation we are observing? Is it possible that merely the control and service systems of the Union
7 UNHCR Global Trends 2017.
8 United Nations, Population Division 2017.
9 United Nations, National Accounts Main Aggregates Database 2017.
were affected by the crisis? In order to decide, focus will be laid on the functioning of the asylum related control and service system of the European Union.