Poverty migration continues in Mexico: economic shortages, underemployment, stagnant local economies and food poverty conditions in the country’s five poorest states have resulted in at least 419 thousand Mexicans immigrating to the United States in the past five years.
According to the National Population Council (Conapo), this represents 27 percent of the 1.5 million Mexicans across the country who migrated to that country during that period for various reasons.
Puebla, Oaxaca, Veracruz, Guerrero and Chiapas the five entities with the highest number of people living in poverty emerged as one of the most important expulsions of migrants in the past half a decade, according to data from the National Population Council (Conapo). During those five years, the economies of these five entities were practically in permanent recession or with very low growth rates.
Since 2016, a total of 118,412 people from Puebla have left the country to move abroad. It is followed by 105,109 Oaxacans, 91,949 from Veracruz and 72,109 from Guerrero. During the same period, Chiapas expelled 32,264 inhabitants.
Conapo estimates that the most frequent destinations for Poblanos are California (30.4 percent), New York (21.3 percent), New Jersey (9.2 percent), Illinois (6.4 percent) and Texas (5.2 percent) goods.
Within the figures is a handy thermometer to determine which municipalities are deporting more migrants Institute for Mexicans Abroad (IME), which records the number of applications for consular plates in the Mexican consular network in the United States. According to his records, much of the majority of the poblanos already living on the other side of the Rio Grande came from the state capital.
But municipalities with high poverty rates also stand out, such as Atlixco, Izúcar de Matamoros, San Pedro Cholula and Chietla, where a large number of people came to process their registration, used to access various services used by the migrant population, such as bank accounts. There are 8,681 consular registers of these four municipalities; it is no coincidence that their poverty levels fluctuate between 59 and 77 percent of the population.
On Guerrero, IME figures place Acapulco as the municipality of the poor that more residents decide to migrate abroad after registering 9,672 consular records of Mexican population in the United States. It is also one of the 10 municipalities with the most homicides in 2021.
Currently, the mayor’s office, which is home to one of the top tourist destinations in the country, records a high level of insecurity and according to the National Social Development Policy Evaluation Council (Coneval), poverty seizes 56.6 percent of Acapulqueños.
Other municipalities in Guerrero with a high number of consular registrations in the United States are Teloloapan (3,264), Coyuca de Catalán (2,219), San Marcos (2,089), Cutzamala de Pinzón (2,021) and Chilpancingo (2,000 11). Each of these demarcations has a percentage of poor residents that varies between 57 and 78 percent.
In Oaxaca, the municipalities that send the most people to the United States are Oaxaca de Juárez, Santiago Juxtlahuaca, Putla Villa de Guerrero, San Martín Peras, and Mihuatlán de Porfirio Díaz. In these municipalities, only the capital shows a poverty rate of less than 50 percent.
Guanajuato, with the largest increase in the number of residents migrating to the US
Despite migration bounded by poverty, other entities with good economic performance, but with a marked deterioration in security, have also contributed to the wave of Mexican migration in recent years.
This is the case with Guanajuato, an entity experiencing the greatest phenomenon of international emigration in the country: 183 thousand 545 residents moved to another country between 2016 and 2020. This means that 101 people emigrated every day for more than five years.
The entity controlled by Diego Sinhue Rodriguez It was hit by an inordinate surge in violence during that time, making the entity the bloodiest in the country in terms of deliberate killings, as well as being one of the main action points of criminal groups committed to fuel theft.
In 2020 alone, the year the Covid-19 pandemic made it difficult for migrants to cross the border into the United States, Mexican authorities predict that 37,743 Guanajuatoans will have left their homes to seek new horizons beyond national borders .
Michoacán is the second entity with the highest international emigration in the country. Conapo estimates indicate that at least 127,904 residents of this demarcation left our borders with the aim of settling in another country.
Historically, this entity has experienced a high degree of international migration and in the 1990s it was the greatest expeller of Mexicans abroad. Conapo estimates that by 2020 at least 26,000 residents will have left their homes to try their luck in another country.
Most Michoacanos who go to live in the United States will go to California or Illinois —Where the city of Chicago is located46.7 percent of Michoacanos who migrate to the United States go to the first state, while 12.4 percent do to the second, according to the Census Office’s Mexican population consular registrations.
Most of the Michoacanos on the U.S. population lists are mainly from the following municipalities: Morelia (7 percent), Apatzingán (4.2 percent), Hidalgo (4.2 percent), Zamora (3.3 percent), and Huetamo (3 , 1 percent).
In contrast, the states registering the lowest levels in terms of the expulsion of migrants are Campeche (2 thousand 541), Baja California Sur (2 thousand 961), Quintana Roo (5 thousand 846), Tabasco (7 thousand 280) and Colima (9,080 ). Among these five entities, there are barely 27,708 international emigrants, representing just 15 percent of the cases recorded in Guanajuato.
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