STATISTICAL COMMISSION and ECONOMIC COMMISSION FOR EUROPE
CONFERENCE OF EUROPEAN STATISTICIANS

Forty-third plenary session
(Geneva, 12-15 June 1995)

CES/1995/R.9
9 February 1995

1. The ECE/EUROSTAT joint meeting of the Working Group on Migration statistics was held in Luxembourg from 28-30 November 1994. It was attended by Albania, Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russian Federation, Slovak Republic, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, the United Kingdom and the United States. The International Labour Office, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, the UN High Commission for Refugees, the UN Statistical Division and the Office of the Intergovernmental Consultations on Migration were also represented. The European Free Trade Association and the International Centre for Migration Policy Development also attended.

2. The provisional agenda was adopted.

3. Mr. A. Isupov (Russian Federation) was elected to co- chair the meeting with Mr. H. Charlier of Eurostat.

4. The most important subjects on the agenda of the meeting from the standpoint of the programme of work of the Conference of European Statisticians were the review of the UN recommendations on international migration statistics which is currently being conducted by Eurostat, the UN Statistical Division and the ECE secretariat, and work on possible future recommendations on asylum and refugee statistics.

5. The participants were informed of the results achieved to date in the review of the UN recommendations on international migration statistics, and of planned future work on the review. The meeting endorsed the approach being taken in the review, and provided Eurostat, the ECE secretariat and UNSTAT with advice on approaches to be used in the subsequent stages of the review.

6. Future work on the review of the recommendations will focus on aspects such as the following: potential or actual use of various sources to compile data on different categories of migrants; classification of different types of migrants; definitions of different types of migrants; statistical treatment of special groups of migrants (e.g. refugees, asylum seekers, foreign students); the formulation of simpler and easier to apply definitions; and the formulation of possible future draft recommendations relating to asylum and refugee statistics.

7. Eurostat, UNSTAT and the ECE secretariat plan to follow the following timetable in completing work on the remaining phase of the review process:

• First half of 1995 - UNSTAT will contact selected countries in other regions, to obtain their views on the current UN recommendations and their applicability in national contexts.
• July 1995 - UNSTAT and Eurostat will jointly organize an Expert Group Meeting, possibly in Geneva, to consider the findings of various studies undertaken as part of the review process
• January 1996 - Eurostat/ECE joint meeting of the Working Group on Migration Statistics (Luxembourg), to consider progress made in the review of the recommendations.
• February 1997 - The report of the July 1995 Expert Group Meeting, and possibly a draft revised set of recommendations on international migration statistics, will be submitted to the Statistical Commission for consideration.