CHAPTER 3
Return Migration and Small Enterprise Development in the Maghreb Flore Gubert and Christophe J. Nordman
The Middle East and North Africa region is one of the most remarkable regions in the world in terms of international migration, with several coexisting “migration systems� (labor-exporting countries in the Maghreb and Mashreq, labor-importing Gulf Cooperation Council states, both laborexporting and transit countries, and so forth). Within the Grand Maghreb, Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia have been experiencing massive labor emigration to Europe since the 1960s. This is particularly true for Morocco, where emigration has always been considered an export that should be promoted for the benefit of the country. Algeria and Tunisia initially followed a similar policy, but in the 1970s, both encouraged their emigrants to return (Baldwin-Edwards 2005). The impact of return migration is central to a discussion on the benefits and costs associated with migration. While remittances fill a central role in providing foreign exchange and lowering poverty, it is increasingly acknowledged that migration can lead to other forms of beneficial transfers
This study was commissioned by the World Bank and is part of the MIREM project financed by the European Union and the European University Institute (www.mirem.eu). The authors would like to thank Jean-Pierre Cassarino, Antonella Guarneri, Oleksiy Ivaschenko, Sara Johansson de Silva, and the participants of the Second Meeting of the MIREM Project in April 2008 for very helpful suggestions and comments on first drafts of this study. 103