Environmental influences on skilled worker migration from Bangladesh to Canada

Abstract

Environmental hazards that are important drivers of migration within Bangladesh appear to have little or no influence on current Bangladeshi migration to Canada.Air and water pollution, sanitation problems, lack of green space, and food adulteration are considerations for many professionals migrating from Dhaka to Toronto.Urban environmental problems interact with economic, political, and social factors to influence household migration decisions, to varying degrees.We conducted focus groups in Toronto with 44 recent skilled worker immigrants from Bangladesh to explore whether their decisions to migrate to Canada may have been influenced by environmental problems. Previous research has documented how floods, cyclones, droughts, and seasonal precipitation variations affect ruralurban migration patterns within Bangladesh, and to its neighbours. Most participants had not experienced such environmental hazards, having lived in Dhaka prior to migrating. However, Dhaka's ongoing problems with air and water pollution, sanitation, lack of green space, and food adulteration were cited by 70% as being relevant considerations for the decision to migrate. The degree of influence varied considerably among participants. Roughly 16% said pollution was their primary motivation for leaving, household members having suffered from illnesses traceable to air pollution or poor sanitation. Another 54% stated that Dhaka's environmental problems were part of a wider range of quality-of-life concerns that had some influence on their decision. The findings suggest that current migration to Canada is not connected with environmental migration that takes place within Bangladesh, but that urban environmental problems combined with other social, economic, and political factors can help drive migration.

Linking climate change, environmental degradation, and migration: An update after 10 years

“…Thresholds were identified as crucial to understanding the context of climate change rather early (Barnett & Adger, 2003), but questioning them in relation to migration emerged only recently (Bardsley & Hugo, 2010; McLeman et al, 2017). In addition to the idea of thresholds as tipping points beyond which massive migration starts, the more general idea that the mechanisms linking climate and migration evolve over time (Gray et al, 2020) and that a distinction should be made between direct and indirect linkages (DeLongueville et al, 2019) has also gained momentum recently, as well as an interest in the impacts of series of successive hazards rather than hazards taken in isolation (Nawrotzki & DeWaard, 2016).…”

Heterogeneity of educational attainment of talents in China: Spatial and temporal patterns and driving factors

“…地 理 科 学 进 展 第 42 卷 顶尖学历人才 [5] 。同时， 面向不同学历人才的引进 措施大同小异， 主要集中在直接落户， 以及随学历 提升而阶梯式增加的安家费、 生活补贴等 [6] 。人才 集聚或流动本质上是一个经济因素和公共服务等 资源配置的市场化过程， 厘清中国城市不同学历人 才集疏的空间分布态势， 以及不同学历人才分布的 影响机理的差异性， 对于优化不同规模等级城市的 经济高质量发展格局以及制定因类而异的人才政 策具有重要意义。 人才区位选择的影响因素是人才地理学或人 才经济学的主要研究领域， 相关理论不断完善并呈 现出多元化的趋势。早期的新古典迁移理论指出 迁移是个人理性计算收入和就业机会等经济成本 收益的产物 [7] ， 人才倾向迁移至高收入和就业机会 充足的区域 [8][9][10] 。随后， 19 世纪 70 年代 Graves [11] 提 出了舒适性(amenities)影响人口增长和人口迁移的 经典理论， 认为除了收入、 就业机会等经济因素， 气 候舒适性也是区域吸引人口的重要内在优势， 并且 随着收入水平的提高， 家庭迁移过程中对舒适性的 需求不断增加 [12] 。如今舒适性的涵义得到了广泛 拓展， 从一种身体感知上的舒适性扩充至有具体形 态的人造服务设施， 如学校、 医院等教育医疗公共 服务设施 [13][14] ， 以及咖啡厅、 酒吧、 电影院、 图书馆等 文化娱乐服务设施 [15][16] 。21 世纪初， Florida [17] 的创 意阶层理论将区域人才集聚完全视为舒适性决定 的过程， 忽略了经济因素对人才集聚的重要作用。 然而， 相关理论研究仍存在两方面问题。第一， 舒 适性对吸引人才集聚的作用仍有待进一步讨论。 一些美国和西欧学者发现人才仍主要向就业机会 丰富的区域集聚， 而非气候舒适宜居和文化休闲设 施完善的城市 [18][19][20] ， 中国 21 世纪初期的一些实证研 究也表明社会服务设施及自然环境舒适性并未显 著促进人才流入 [9][10]21] 。第二， 舒适性因素框架有待 进一步完善。2011 年后中国局部地区开始爆发空 气污染问题， 一些研究表明孟加拉国等发展中国家 的空气污染是其人才迁移至发达国家的重要原因 [22] ， 而空气环境质量舒适性对中国人才分布的影响仍 不得而知。 20 世纪末期， Birdsall 等 [23] 提出了人力资本梯度 的概念， 将人力资本划分成初、 中、 高阶三级梯度， 分别对应于小学、 中学和高等教育文化程度的阶 层 [24][25][26] ， 本质上人力资本梯度就是指劳动力学历水 平的高低分异， 人力资本梯度升级就是劳动力受教 育程度提高而导致的低阶人力资本向高阶人力资 本的跃迁过程 [24,26] 。而具有高等学历的人才则属于 人力资本梯度中的高阶人力资本， 内部也存在着大 专、 本科、 硕士和博士四级由低到高的学历梯度分 异。不同学历梯度的人才具有知识技能的高低分 化， 产业是劳动力就业的蓄水池， 产业附加值的高低 分化就在劳动力市场上产生了对不同学历人才的需 求差异， 供需匹配的市场机制异质性形成了不同学 历人才迁移决策需求偏好的差异性， 进而塑造出人 才地理景观的学历梯度分异特征。然而， 现有大多 数研究还是把高等学历人才视为一个整体 [9][10]21,[27][28][29][30] 平， 也代表了区域的高阶人力资本 [31][32][33] 。人才集聚 也是一种动态变化过程， 本文分别采用 2005-2015 年大专、 本科及研究生学历人才比...…”