Socio-economic status of international return migrants to the Berekum municipality of Ghana

Elijah Yendaw, University of Cape Coast

The phenomenon of return migration has been neglected in many African studies. However, within the last two decades, there has been a growing recognition of the developmental potential between international migration, return and development. Data from a survey involving 120 return migrants were used to assess the socio-economic status of the return migrants. Snowballing and simple random sampling techniques were used to select the respondents for the study. Results from the survey showed that a significant proportion (84%) acquired critical skills and the dominant skill gained was specialized technical skills. With regards to their asset-holding status, the study revealed that more than half (68.3%)of the returnees own houses and a large proportion acquired consumer durable goods. The study, therefore, recommends that government should design and implement reintegration policies to ensure a maximum utilization of returnees’ skills and resources for the socioeconomic development of the country.