Migrant workers transferring cash to their relatives in the less-developed world paid an average of 15 to 20 per cent of the total amount in transmission costs, UN special representative on migration Peter Sutherland told a Leinster House committee yesterday, writes Deaglán de Bréadún, Foreign Affairs Correspondent.
A former attorney-general of Ireland and European commissioner, Mr Sutherland was appointed last November by UN secretary-general Kofi Annan as his special representative for migration.
He told the Oireachtas Committee on European Affairs, chaired by Fine Gael TD John Deasy, that the official level of emigrants' remittances was $232 billion (€181.3 billion) last year.
But this was "only the tip of the iceberg" and the real figure was probably double that amount, Mr Sutherland said. By comparison, the total amount of development aid last year was $106.5 billion.
The existing transfer mechanisms for remittances were "not the most efficient" and quite costly. This imposed a burden on "the poorest people in the world".
The World Bank had carried out a detailed study of these extra costs and it was a matter that could be discussed further at UN level.
Mr Sutherland was briefing the committee about his role in preparing a special two-day meeting on migration issues at the UN in September.
He had met representatives of about 80 different governments.
The September meeting "should not be the end but the beginning of a process of dialogue" and there was a proposal to establish a "rolling forum" on migration and development.
The two issues of migration and the environment would be the "major topics of this century", Mr Sutherland said.
Several committee members recalled in the discussion how emigrants' remittances were a mainstay of the Irish economy in times past.
Mr Sutherland said that "virtually nothing" had ever happened at the UN on migration. "It was always blocked." There was no UN body which specifically dealt with the issue.
Commenting on migration into Ireland, he said: "It has been an amazingly constructive experience and reflects very well on the Irish people."
He said that in 2000, some 23 per cent of the population of Paris was foreign-born and 28 per cent of the population of London.