Achieve legal identity for all

IOM will support States to advance legal identity for all, as a core enabler of sustainable development and safe and regular migration. Through the implementation of its Institutional Strategy on Legal Identity, IOM will support States’ efforts to strengthen non-discriminatory access to legal identity and adequate documentation for all migrants. IOM will identify opportunities for future programming and areas of collaboration with the UN Legal Identity Agenda Taskforce (UNLIA) and will work with partners to develop initiatives to improve civil registration and vital statistics systems, strengthen the infrastructure to register births and other life events for migrants, and the issuance of identity and travel documents, as well as making these services readily available in countries of transit and destination.

LAST UPDATED: 4/JUL/23

In support of this pledge, IOM has been rolling out its Institutional Strategy on Legal Identitywhich was released in May 2022. The strategy guides the advancement of IOM’s relevant programming to ensure migrants and people on the move have equal and non-discriminatory access to legal identity in line with GCM objective 4. 

• The Roll-out of IOM’s Institutional Strategy on Legal Identity at the regional and country level, was centred on a series of dedicated roadshows and masterclasses for IOM offices, government counterparts and UN partners. Focusing on the operationalization of the four pillars of IOM’s Strategy, along with a roundtable consultation through the roadshows, these workshops have now taken place in Uruguay, Senegal, South Africa, Tanzania and Thailand, with more governments attending these sessions. 

• In September 2022, within the framework of the 77th UN General Assembly, IOM held a side event on “Legal Identity as an Enabler of Sustainable Development” which shared successful practices on strengthening registration and document issuance capacities at the national level, and through consular networks. By inviting Member State participants, as well as UN partners from the UN Legal Identity Agenda Taskforce, the event allowed for a discussion centred on tackling the challenges related to human mobility and access to documentation. 

• IOM has also started a project to develop recommendations on the facilitation of access to legal identity for migrants, in six countries – Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brazil, Republic of Moldova, Niger, Peru, and Thailand. A series of field assessments in each of these countries started in October 2022, to collect and eventually promote good practices and capacity development options for the involved States, with the objective to publish a guide to present all the information gathered by June 2023, thus directly contributing to ongoing efforts in implementing GCM objective 4.