Dollo-Addo
Somali Refugees in Dolo Ado, Ethiopia (UNHCR Ethiopia/ Somali refugees / J. Ose / June 2012)

Alexander Betts is Professor of Forced Migration and International Affairs at the University of Oxford and author of "The Wealth of Refugees: How Displaced People Can Build Economies" (Oxford University Press), which was published in April.

1. Your book argues that the likelihood of a long-term refugee presence in host countries around the world is only going to grow as the climate crisis deepens and more people are forced to cross borders. What does this mean for how refugees should be viewed in host countries?

We live in an age of displacement. We are going to face rising numbers of refugees but also declining political will to admit asylum seekers. Climate change will exacerbate this trend. But it’s worth being aware that most refugees are not in Europe or North America. Eight-five per cent are hosted by low and middle-income countries like Jordan, Uganda, and Colombia, which neighbour conflict and crisis. If refugee protection is to be sustainable then these countries need to view refugees as a benefit rather than simply a burden. In order for that to happen, the rich world has to support these countries, not just by offering humanitarian assistance, but also by providing development assistance. The key is to recognise and build upon the skills, talents, and aspirations of refugees themselves – to enable receiving societies to see them as contributors. This requires significant investment in job creation and public services like education and health that benefit both refugees and nearby host communities.

2. "Self-reliance" programmes of the kind you examine in the book began in Greece in the 1920s for refugees fleeing Ottoman Empire states. What political conditions existed there at the time that made these programmes viable?

Self-reliance is the idea that refugees can be empowered to live independently of aid – for example, by having the right to work and freedom of movement within a host country. Yet too often today, refugee-hosting countries deny refugees access to labour markets and insist they live indefinitely in refugee camps. “Self-reliance” has taken-off in refuge policy debates, but it is not a new idea. Following the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, Greece worked with the League of Nations High Commissioner for Refugees to support refugees to work in agriculture across the country. It was able to do this partly because of labour shortages and surplus arable land, partly because many arriving were Greek Orthodox and so welcomed by the receiving society, and partly because Greece enjoyed the support of the international community through the International Labour Organisation (ILO).

3. A century on from the early Greek experiment, Dollo Ado in Ethiopia is a model for how refugees and hosts can actually work alongside one another in cooperatives. How does the model work – and how was it originally sold to the host community?

The five Dollo Ado camps were created just over a decade ago to provide sanctuary to Somali refugees fleeing conflict and drought. Despite being in an arid, insecure region with limited infrastructure, they have benefited from an innovative new approach to refugee assistance. The cooperative model offers group-based income-generating activities in areas such as agriculture, livestock, and energy. Half of the members are refugees and half are members of the host community. They have been created through unprecedented private sector investment; the IKEA Foundation has invested over $100m, including in relevant infrastructure such as irrigation. The cooperatives have led to increases in income-levels for both refugees and locals, as well as improving relations between refugees and hosts. The key to them being accepted has been that the host community has shared the benefits of these employment programmes.

4. Do you feel a Dollo Ado-style model could ever work in towns in the UK that host refugee communities, especially where there can be significant local hostility towards refugees?

It’s crucial that host communities perceive that they benefit from the presence of refugees. Effective refugee policies need to ensure improved access to jobs and public services for both refugees and citizens living in refugee-hosting areas. This applies as much in the UK as it does in Ethiopia. We know from existing research that refugees can make a positive net economic contribution to host societies, whether in high or low-income countries. In the Ethiopian context, the presence of refugee camps has created thousands of jobs for citizens and new markets likely to be worth more than $50m in annual household expenditure. Research in Europe and the United States suggests that refugees’ tax contributions are greater than spending on public programmes for refugees, and that they contribute to GDP by starting new businesses and replacing aging populations. We also know that in both Europe and Africa, it is refugees’ economic contributions that matter most for shaping host community attitudes towards refugees. The difficulty is that political decision-making is not always shaped by evidence relating to economic contribution.

5. The UK government right now is going to great lengths to deter refugees from arriving here. Is this a government that cannot, for whatever reason, see refugees as potential contributors, and instead sees them only as a burden?

The British government has consciously created policies to deter the arrival of asylum-seekers. Its policies have deliberately nurtured a “hostile environment” and the current UK Borders and Nationality Bill criminalises the arrival of asylum seekers via irregular routes. The government views reducing asylum claims in the UK as a political necessity: in 2021 opinion polls reveal that immigration is the single most important issue, and it made (unrealistic) commitments that Brexit would mean sovereign borders. But underlying this is also a failure to recognise that around two-thirds of asylum seekers coming to the UK are refugees in need of international protection, and refugees are not an inevitable burden. Not only do we have humanitarian obligations towards refugees, but they can make significant contributions, and demographic trends and labour shortages make their contributions especially important. The UK government and British media need to recognise these contributions and change the narrative on refugees.

6. What would be needed to get greater buy-in for the idea of refugee self-reliance and long-term settlement in countries where intolerance is high? Is it merely that political conditions need to change, or do those who argue that the economy can’t absorb a sizeable expansion in labour without entailing loss of jobs for locals have a valid point?

In low and middle-income countries that host most of the world’s refugees, there is huge variation in policies. While some, such as Uganda and Colombia, offer refugees the right to work and freedom of movement, others like Tanzania and Bangladesh insist on the encampment of refugees. But some countries, such as Ethiopia and Kenya, have also embarked on gradual change. The key to opening up self-reliance opportunities and socio-economic rights for refugees in these countries is to ensure that the national governments and local authorities in refugee-hosting regions benefit. Development assistance, trade concessions, and private sector investment are needed to ensure receiving country politicians recognise a benefit. Jordan, for instance, changed its policies to allow Syrian refugees to work because of a combination of trade concessions from the European Union and finance from the World Bank. Rich countries have a strong incentive to support this type of change in host countries because it offers a means to reduce the need for onward migration.

7. There is a lag between arrival of refugees and the point at which they become net economic contributors. Several studies in Australia found that refugees only begin to make a positive economic contribution 10 or 12 years after settling. Does this reality complicate any advocacy for long-term integration, particularly among already deprived communities who are asked to host refugee populations?

Evidence from Australia and also the United States relating to the integration of, for example, Vietnamese refugees, does suggest that some of the contributions by refugees are lagged over time. The most significant contributions often come from the second-generation children of refugees. This observed lag has also been evident to some extent in Germany’s integration of over one million Syrian refugees. It stems from the fact that when refugees move from poor countries to rich countries they often lack the education and skills to immediately contribute to high productivity economies. It takes time to provide the necessary educational and training opportunities. This can be addressed partly through clear public communication and upfront investment in education and vocational education opportunities.

8. You mention two countries, Tanzania and Denmark, where a generally tolerant historic attitude towards refugees has been replaced by an intolerant one. But for countries that have moved in the opposite direction, what role did self-reliance programmes play?

Several refugee-hosting countries have moved in a progressive direction. In 2016, Jordan changed its policy of not allowing Syrian refugees to access labour markets, allowing them to work in selected sectors. It did so partly because of an agreement called the Jordan Compact that offered the country EU trade concessions and World Bank concessionary finance in return for letting refugees work. In 2019, Ethiopia adopted new legislation that potentially gives refugees the right to work and freedom of movement. It did so because of international support for its national development strategy that offered support for Ethiopian industrialisation in exchange for offering jobs to refugees. In 2021, Colombia committed to allowing the temporary integration of all of its 1.7 million Venezuelan refugees in the country, partly because donor countries committed to support the country’s development-based approaches for refugee-hosting cities. In all of these cases, international support for job-creation programmes that benefit both refugees and citizens have been crucial for unlocking progressive policy change.

9. What can we take from the examples of countries that have gradually opened up to refugees, particularly when arguments against integrating refugees are likely to intensify in the future as a result of depleted resources and greater global precarity?

Advocacy for refugee rights is becoming increasingly challenging around the world. Automation, offshoring, the rise of China and the economic legacy of Covid-19 are all adding to feelings of vulnerability among citizens in Europe and North America. Politicians often find it much easier to scapegoat migration than to explain the complexities of structural change in the global economy. Rights-based arguments based on international law are important, but they are increasingly falling on deaf ears. What is also needed is pragmatism, to create mechanisms to ensure that host societies around the world benefit - and perceive that they benefit - from the presence of refugees. This requires targeted policies that systematically improve access to employment and public services, such as education and health, for both refugees and nearby host community members.