Repository of Practices

Primary GCM Objectives

GCM Guiding Principles*

*All practices are to uphold the ten guiding principles of the GCM. This practice particularly exemplifies these listed principles.

Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

Dates

2023 - Present

Type of practice

Measuring/Data collection

Geographic scope

Local:

Mexico City

Summary

Quantifying environmental displacement is challenging given the multiple drivers of such movement, related methodological challenges, and the lack of willingness of the government to include climate change indicators in official migration data. In Mexico, official statistics on the number of entries, irregular migrants, visa issuing, resident permits, deportations, asylum seekers, migration detention, and others are deficient and do not provide accurate and timely information. Recently, the official data has started to include sex and age disaggregation; however, intersectionality needs to still be reflected in all categories. To the date, the Ministry of the Interior has not published an estimate on environmentally internationally displaced populations. For this reason, the Institute for Women in Migration (IMUMI), a national NGO advocating for women's rights in all phases of migration, started to collect surveys for its clients about the links between migration and the environment as a driver. The IMUMI's Legal Clinic provides comprehensive accompaniment for women migrants, asylum seekers, refugees, and returnees and their families in Mexico. Through its protocol that includes a welcome survey, IMUMI's staff now ask six questions about the changes in the environment in their communities and the situation in their place of origin. Once the survey is done, IMUMI's clients provide more information through an in-depth interview where our social work staff identify their legal, psychological, and basic needs, they now ask further questions related to climate displacement if needed. For instance, IMUMI's staff now deep dive into how our client's project life changed due to food scarcity, disasters, or other adverse effects of climate change.

Organizations

Main Implementing Organization(s)

Instituto para las Mujeres en la Migración (IMUMI)

Detailed Information

Institute for Women in Migration (IMUMI)

Benefit and Impact

With this data collection practice, IMUMI adds to reduce the gap in understanding and addressing the needs of climate-displaced women in Mexico. IMUMI will launch a report with some of the non-sensitive information of clients, so other civil society organization that protects the rights of migrants develop their standardised framework for collecting climate displacement data. The information collected also serves for IMUMI to provide comprehensive durable solutions analyses, adapted to the local and country context, to inform effective protection responses.

Key Lessons

IMUMI's clients are mostly women from unprivileged backgrounds whose migration experiences have been challenging. Therefore, psychological first aid and safe space must be in place when conducting interviews. The questions related to this topic are not applied to the person if the interviewer determines that her case is sensitive and/or serious (IMUMI has received women who have been victims of serious episodes of violence, for example). This guideline is intended to respect the experience of the interviewee.
Only trained IMUMI staff are allowed to conduct in-depth interviews. Moreover, the systematization of data requires time and capacity from IMUMI’s staff. Also, it was challenging to select the questions that provide insight into understanding mobility decisions, triggers, and drivers. For example, using a ranking scale to allow displaced people to indicate the extent to which each factor influenced their decision-making. This gives better insight into motivations based on culture, identity, or specific needs leading to more effective and context-specific assistance.

Recommendations(if the practice is to be replicated)

- Mainstream climate change action in all indicators or MEAL forms
- should be taken into consideration that the questions may change and/or adapt over time.
-Knowledge of the geographical context of the places of origin of the population
-Work alongside awareness campaigns with the target population; one problem we have noticed is that migrants do not always recognize the impact that the effects of climate change may have on their migratory movements.

Innovation

This data collection practice is innovative because it adds to new data on trapped populations. Some populations affected by environmental degradation and disasters may not be able to move due to a lack of financial resources, disability, social reasons (such as gender issues), or social networks. They are highly vulnerable populations, but data to inform action and protection are scarce. IMUMI adds to provide a radiography of people's needs.

This data collection practice is people-centered because it enforces active listening from women impacted by migration. IMUMI listens to and gathers information for and with clients. In the welcome survey and deep interview IMUMI sees people's answers as lived experiences and contributions. Clients are truly listened to and are kept at the heart of all decision-making; how IMUMI's service is commissioned, provided, and organized. They decided if their information could be stored or made public and on their terms, as they are the right holder of the climate displacement information.
On the other hand, this practice is gender sensitive because IMUMI ensures that all data is disaggregated data by gender, age, income, people with disabilities, and other important information that is often missing from disaster and climate-related displacement data.

Additional Resources

Instituto para las Mujeres en la Migración (IMUMI)

Date submitted:

13 December 2023

Disclaimer: The content of this practice reflects the views of the implementers and does not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations, the United Nations Network on Migration, and its members.