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TEDx Talks
Title: Forced Migration and Resilience: How Countries Stand to Benefit | Miguel Rozo | TEDxTerryTalks
Published: 2016-02-17
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=INM_53huJwQ
now the experiences of those affected by forced migration are different from one another but one thing they all have in common is a desire to live and desire to survive the yearning to stay alive transcends the conventional whether it's making perilous journeys through international waters on an inflatable vessel or making other perilous journeys through international borders %HESITATION undocumented or standing host countries despite reduction in prejudice
that desire to live not resilience is what has compelled millions of people around the world to take desperate measures to not only guarantee their survival but often times that of the families to up until the age of nine one could say that I had a good childhood appearance I work very hard to isolate me from the unpleasant realities of growing up in Columbia or your schooling
has experienced civil conflict between left wing guerrilla insurgents the military backed by the government and right wing paramilitary groups financed by landowners corrupt politicians and other private interest group not to mention drug cartels and other criminal groups now in Colombia social mobility is something that is really difficult but this means is that if you're born poor you die poor climb in the social ladder is literally
impossible but my parents accomplished just not just what was considering possible through hard work they're able to buy a nice home involves considerable of part of town but some of our neighbors been like that and they resorted to lake when US as insurgents in order to take aware home and expels from the community now when we brought this complaints for local authorities what started off as
simple complained to city hall soon turned into a political person and for the next two years we moved around for two years looking for safety and find safe haven find safe haven for all of us we left for home after a kidnapping attempt against yeah actually and we became part of the three point five million people that became displaced as a result of this of a
conflict it was their power and intimidation a city councillor actually who had links to drug cartels and the emerald trade that's horrible started now the last straw was when some man stormed the last place that we're staying in this is the one place up now we don't know whether this people have any connections with people have persecuted us for the previous two years but the evidence
that left behind suggests that the retardant that they're targeting us for they took all information that was related to our documentation our dresses and anything to find us later on but we were lucky not to be home that night and as improbable as this may sound I attribute our departure that night my mother's premonition that something was going to happen to us that day not our
lives were going to land and I still recall her pleas for help it is a night that I'll never forget now for many people the leaf through forced migration are fleeing on their political asylum is an easy because oftentimes any proof to corroborate your story so that was our intention fleet for the US and the clean up political asylum so we only took three suitcases Sam
barely any pictures from a childhood and the third one reason why I only have a few images as I was growing up but thanks to American image thanks American immigration were granted temporary asylum and we would stand the last for the next three years now as I tell my story mostly gonna be making a few arguments as to why higher income countries stand to benefit from
taking in refugees asylum seekers and other migrants and one reason is because there is an aging population phenomena occurring in higher income country there is a lot of old people the reason for that is because while there many reasons but one of the main reasons is because the baby boomers are retiring now this is the generation that was born following were will too it's been roughly
ninety four and nineteen forty six in nineteen sixty four and now they're they're going to be retiring more resources are going to be required in order to find many of the social services and healthcare benefits that we have nowadays there will also be a substantial decrease in not tax revenue and this it is a phenomenon occurring in whole or hiking countries the conference board of Canada
estimates that will need to attract around three hundred fifty thousand migrants per year to sustain our economy and Canada's girly thickening two hundred sixty thousand people and I argue that high income countries stand to benefit from thickened and resilient and hard working immigrants that can guarantee the survival of the economies and prohibit and avoid the fall of the population not living in a foreign country I
can be difficult and challenging I think some of you can relate to this others oftentimes cultural and language barriers that one has to overcome all the gonna tell you living in Miami made the transition much easier S. basically we want spoke Spanish it actually took me over a month to find someone that spoke English outside of your work so that was a real innocence really nothing
but only then I just realize that our journey has just begun there was word that poultry slaughter houses would hire anyone regardless of their ethnicity or their legal status so we made the move to Mississippi in a deep American south we were would settle for the next three years now tell me all about word before rific working conditions a place like this for both animals that
are mistreated and for employees who were only paid an exploded for no more than two hundred dollars a week but I recommend you watch the documentary for link by Robert Kenner for more details now although the nature of their jobs was not glamorous my parents were determined to work hard as many other immigrants around the world have shown through the resilience when the adopt working in
your country now time for lesson number two so but this is not a case study are in Canada %HESITATION between let's assume anyone in nineteen eighty one the country except the roughly sixty thousand so called boat people from Southeast Asia and within a decade eighty six percent of refugees were working at the heart healthy lifestyles and spoke English with some proficiency if people will more likely
twelve jobs than the average Canadian and one five was self employed not to mention the fact that so many of the Assad became reliable taxpayers so they were not a drain on on the taxpayer they were taxpayers and worldwide local populations have benefited in nineteen out of the book above the twenty industrialized nations as a result of immigration and what's good about my story so %HESITATION
in Mississippi are there were both challenges and %HESITATION but also living there was rewarding as you can tell from some of the science fair projects that that I was working on but and whether it was I've been embroiled in in the racial tension so that the American south or just adjusting to everyday to everyday life it was something that we have to contend with but the
financial and a psychological stress to my parents and go with great but I still remember the quotes of inspiration by my mother to motivate us to work hard one of them was whatever is gained whatever is worth in life is going through hard work and he was this short inspirational quotes that allowed them to keep working and find the resilience to move forward and move a
hat and soon my dad found out job those closer to his fielding very far with to be precise that's number twenty seven over there really nice called away and %HESITATION so that's how we're able to qualify for skilled worker visa to come to Canada and three years later we arrived here now I'm unlike many in immigrants we actually moved to rule Canada not a big city
we did move to Calgary first but then we settled in our the BC interior and I became subject you love much racial discrimination and prejudice is the result of Michael and background believe it or not I actually did know what cocaine bust until I came to Canada it wasn't until another greatest even ask me about some cocaine on me that I I said what what I
mean but anyways I become so ashamed of I think it's a shame to where I was from that I no longer tell people where I was working from Manda but I wanted to fit in but you know what I mean when you when you're in in the town of fifteen thousand people and you're the only Latin American in your school then fitting them becomes a bit
of a challenge now as I was mentioning as I keep saying throughout my talk it was this resilience to work hard and move ahead in society that my parents could work and then finally allowed us to improve our standard of living but to this day my parents still work very labor intensive jobs in the case of my father for instance even though he's a trained dog
animal scientist and he went universe of for ten years it still works in a bar in a very labor intensive setting I don't like the stereotype of many refugees and asylum seekers and migrants around the world we have never been a burden on the social services system and that is a trend I seen worldwide my parents have always wanted to work hard no one of the
reasons that my father is also continue to work and is laboring job in Texas setting is because of the lack of institutional willingness to allow immigrants to recognize the foreign credentials and this is not a barrier that many immigrants runs around the world continue to face but again at the end of the day I am extremely grateful to be in a country where I can express
myself free from fear free from a persecution in retribution for saying what I think and not and this is also one thing that I like that I like to notice that are not all of our experiences were negative what the contrary there are people that opened their homes and data welcomed us in their communities and these are people that I still cherish so this they've so
the whale you treat a newcomer to your community whether it's a fellow student or someone a recent immigrant it can have a significant impact on the on the rest of the of their lives and on the on the view that on the on the way that they've your country now one more thing that I like to notice that I'm well my sipping and I have a
home based is further highlights if further highlights the what migrants can think to society through little resources were both able to accomplish post secondary education with a lot of student auto I where will too up gain experience in various fields that are now following the path Avengers intercept in my case I turn my passionate to change but Serena project your UBC actually where I've came to
creed workshop stopped writing and do video features to address many of today's so sick Namik environmental issues but unfortunately a lot of the rhetoric around migrants and taking refugees and asylum seekers isn't focused on the benefits of the competing society rather on how much they cost society and I think that's a rhetoric on these to change now clean business editor in chief James going actually agrees
and he says quote don't properly bringing refugees into our country is about charity it's about investing in the future there's and ours a study by maclean's magazine study found that increase in refugees but factor of twenty would cost the Canadian economy around two point two billion dollars nonsense like a lot but it's only sixty three dollars per Canadian not to mention the fact that is are
people that are hard working and resilient so they'll deliver actually payback that initial investment of the country get for them now other my story has been with us to set some light on both the experiences a microsecond face when they arrived new country and also how are developed countries stand to benefit from taking such a refugees migrants can benefit their hosts countries but political rhetoric isn't
always the most accurate and there are many ways that they can benefit where they established themselves whether it whether it's combining the aging population phenomena are also through there in individual economic contributions or increasing labor supply GDP growth there are plenty of reasons as to why high income countries tend to benefit from taking refugees asylum seekers and other migrants but to me it all comes down
to the moral imperative that we as a society have to help one another in times of needs a crisis not just my first second that this where your brother your sister your mother a father what if you lose your front it helps to put things into perspective right at the other day I wish the world guided by moral compass to help one another which should be
taken into account when we lead our everyday lives and one policy makers make this is helping others doesn't mean that we're giving off on our own opportunities what I'm trying to tell you now is that giving people flee adversity the chance building a life will not only enhance our lives but will benefit their host countries economically and the cultural vibrancy
