This publication constitutes the thirty-fifth report of the OECD’s Continuous Reporting System on Migration (known by its French acronym SOPEMI). The report opens with a special chapter for the 50th anniversary of the OECD on international migration and the SOPEMI. The rest of the report is divided into four parts plus a statistical annex.

During its first two decades, the OECD migration interest was focussed on Europe. As membership of the OECD has broadened, so has the geographical scope and range of migration issues moving up on international political agendas. The OECD has always been seen as a unique forum for analytical work and for the exchange of views, experience and best practices, including economic and social aspects of migration. To support this, great effort has been spent to extend migration statistics and improve data comparability. For many decades, migration movements and policies have been monitored using the Continuous Reporting System on Migration (known by its French acronym, SOPEMI), under the auspices of the OECD Working Party. This unique tool allows OECD member countries and non-members to stay on top of the economic and social aspects of migration, including the links between migration and development.

As OECD countries are recovering slowly from the crisis, international migration is at a turning point. The economic downturn marked a decline in permanent regulated labour migration flows of about 7%, but it was free-circulation movements (within the European Union) and temporary labour migration which saw the biggest changes with falls of 36% and 17%, respectively, for 2009 compared to 2007. With the first signs of economic recovery, however, there seems little doubt that migration for employment purposes will be picking up again.

The OECD has always been seen as a unique Forum for analytical work and for the exchange of views, experience and best practices in the field of economic and social aspects of migration. At the same time, a wider range of migration statistics have been developed and great effort spent to improve data comparability. For many decades, the Continuous Reporting System on Migration (SOPEMI), under the auspices of the OECD Working Party on Migration, has been the only such monitor of migration movements and policies. It has witnessed the boom and bust of “guestworker” migration, the tightening of migration policies in the 1980s as well as the changes after the fall of the Iron Curtain in the 1990s and the renewal of interest in labour migration in the 2000s, before the 2008 financial crisis once again put more open migration policies in question. Demographic ageing and globalisation of the world economy pose many challenges to OECD countries in the field of migration. In this context, the OECD remains a privileged observatory of migration movements and policies and a platform for exchange on what works and what does not: a critical instrument to make the most out of international migration to support economic growth in both origin and destination countries.

This chapter analyses migrant entrepreneurship and its contribution to employment creation in OECD countries. In addition, it reviews the policy measures established to fostering migrant entrepreneurship, both for prospective migrant entrepreneurs and for those already in the country.

Israel joined the OECD on 7 September 2010, becoming its 33rd member. Its accession to the OECD brings in its train a different model of immigration and provides an opportunity to compare not only integration policy and outcomes for immigrants, but also the management and impact of temporary labour migration programmes.