THE ADVOCATE 37
VOL. 79 PART 1 JANUARY 2021
India, Mexico, Russia, China and Bangladesh were the top five countries
of origin. Nearly half of all international migrants came from Asia, though
it is still far more common for Asians and Africans to move within their own
continent than to settle further afield.8
Which Countries Take and Produce the Most Refugees?
The United States has historically resettled more refugees than all other
countries in the world combined. In recent years, its intake has slowed. In
2016, it took in 85,000 refugees.9 In 2015, then-president Barack Obama
committed to resettling 110,000 refugees in the 2017 fiscal year, a fifty-seven
per cent increase from 2015 numbers.10
However, in 2017, President Donald Trump cut the cap to 45,000 and, ultimately,
the United States resettled only 21,292 refugees in 2017.11
By contrast, some of the world’s poorer and often less stable countries—
such as Jordan, Lebanon, Pakistan and Uganda—are now the long-term
hosts to the world’s largest populations of refugees. Currently, Turkey is the
leading host of refugees, with 3.5 million, followed by Uganda and Pakistan,
each hosting about 1.4 million, according to the UN High Commissioner for
Refugees, the UN’s refugee agency.12
The proportion of immigrants varies considerably from one country to
another. In some, it exceeds half the population. In others, it is below 0.1
per cent. Which countries have the most immigrants? Where do they come
from? How are they distributed across the world? Below are several charts
addressing these topics: