IOM’s Regional Office for Southern Africa, in partnership with the Government of Malawi, the Southern African Development Community (SADC) Secretariat, UNHCR and UNODC will host a regional technical Migration Dialogue for Southern Africa (MIDSA) conference from 30 June – 2 July 2014 in Lilongwe, Malawi.

The conference will bring together senior government officials responsible for Home Affairs or the Interior from all 15 SADC member states to take stock of actions taken at national and regional level to address mixed and irregular migration in the region since the Dar es Salaam Conference (2010), and update member states on current trends on mixed and irregular migration.

The conference, which is supported by South Africa and the United States, will also review the implementation of the Dar es Salaam Regional Action Plan and propose a common strategy for increasing the effectiveness of measures to address mixed and irregular migration at national and regional levels.

SADC member states are expected to agree a draft regional action plan to ensure the continuity of the Dar es Salaam plan. The conference is also expected to agree a proposal on strengthening regional coordination and harmonization of approaches to address mixed and irregular migration. It will also draw up a roadmap for the finalization of the draft plan, as well as its subsequent adoption at the 2015 Ministerial MIDSA.

International migratory movements in Africa have become more complex in recent years and are increasingly mixed in character. Migration in the region currently consists of population movements by refugees, asylum seekers, economic migrants and other migrants from the region itself and beyond.

IOM research estimates that some 20,000 individuals head south from East Africa and the Horn of Africa every year, although many do not arrive in South Africa. They often suffer great hardships, including starvation and abandonment, physical and sexual abuse, exploitation, lengthy detention and even death (usually by drowning or suffocation in truck containers).
For more than a decade, IOM, UNODC and UNHCR have been promoting the need for regional coordination on migration management, supporting member states in strengthening their responses to cross border organized crime, notably smuggling of migrants and trafficking of persons, and the protection of vulnerable migrants, refugees and asylum seekers within the Southern Africa region.

“The Southern Africa region has limited formal mechanisms for migration management and protection of vulnerable migrants, refugees, and asylum seekers; elimination of migration-related problems such as migrant smuggling and trafficking of persons; and maximization of the developmental gains from migration,” says Bernardo Mariano, IOM Regional Director for Southern Africa
.
“For migration to benefit society at large, it is vital for it to be well-managed. This demands effective inter-state coordination and collaboration among diverse stakeholders,” he adds.

MIDSA is a regional consultative process owned by the SADC member states, supported by IOM and the SADC Secretariat. MIDSA provides a platform for discussing migration issues in an informal and non-binding environment and serves as a vehicle for maintaining and sharing accurate, reliable and up-to-date information on migration trends to stimulate policy and programme development.

For more information, please contact Gaone Dixon at IOM South Africa, Tel: +27 72 127 7094, Email: gdixon@iom.int