The meeting represents an ambitious milestone towards achieving a consensus on the scope and operationalization of the IOM Africa-Europe Flagship Initiative on regular pathways, reinforcing the importance of safe, orderly, and regular migration as a driver of sustainable development.

"Together, we embark on a journey filled with promise --a journey bridging critical skills gaps, enhancing fiscal revenues, and empowering our greatest asset: human capital," said IOM Deputy Director General for Operations Ugochi Daniels.

"By establishing, expanding, and enhancing regular pathways, we connect migrants with opportunities and solutions to harness positive migration and development outcomes for countries of origin, transit and destination."

Africa has a youthful population, with 40 percent of its 1.4 billion people under the age of 15, 62 percent of which are estimated to be of working age by 2050. This demographic shift presents both opportunities to be harnessed, and challenges to be addressed for the continent's labor market development.

Enhancing regular and safe pathways

In this regard, the IOM Africa-Europe Flagship Initiative seeks to enhance and nurture a comprehensive infrastructure for regular pathways, support regional integration and mobility efforts in order to facilitate the safe movement of persons within and between continents, explore and reinforce regional and bilateral cooperation aimed at expanding safe and regular pathways.

"Our objective is unequivocally clear: to transform these multipartite consultations into a unified and definitive African stance, taken by African countries participating in this initiative. By doing so, we aim to forge a singular, powerful, and cohesive voice that advocates for our shared interests on the critical issue of migration. This will involve addressing both regional and global governance to enhance regular pathways between Africa and Europe," said the Director of Global Affairs, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, African Cooperation, and Moroccans Residing Abroad, Mr. Ismail Chekkori.

This technical gathering aims to provide participants with an open space to discuss the benefits and challenges of regular pathways with the goal of reaching a common understanding, with IOM acting as a convenor to support African and European countries to find a balanced approach to advance this important agenda.

Around 100 participants

Participants shared experiences on the progress and gaps in relevant legislative, regulatory and institutional mechanisms and benefited from other successful best practices in delivering on the promise of migration while supporting the world's most vulnerable.

"Facilitating regular migration pathways is crucial. Apart from improving the protection of the rights of migrants, regular mobility contributes to achieving their potential, and enables them to fully contribute to the socio-economic development of the countries of destination, transit and origin," said Nathalie Fustier, UN Resident Coordinator in Morocco.

The meeting brought together around 100 participants including senior officials from participating countries of the Initiative: the Ivory Coast, Egypt, Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Morocco, Nigeria, Senegal, The Gambia, Togo, and Tunisia, along with representatives from the African Union Commission, Regional Economic Communities, United Nations agencies, youth and diaspora representatives, as well as private sector organizations including creative industries.