The majority of Ukrainian refugees are accepted by countries that are prepared for integration of refugees the least. This includes Latvia, according to a report published by the National Integration Evaluation Mechanism (NIEM).
According to public policy centre Providus leading researcher Ieva Raubiško, reception of Ukrainian refugees marks a turning point for many European Union member states, especially for the openness of Ukraine’s neighbours for those people. The report indicates that integration systems of several countries are simply not ready for such a challenge.
The report, which was published by NIEM project, which monitors and evaluates refugee integration policy in 14 EU member states, details major differences between countries’ policies in areas like education, employment, housing and others. Several countries, such as Sweden, for example, have a high integration score (72.5 out of 100). Other countries, such as Hungary (32.8), Bulgaria (37.1) and Romania (38.5) are in the other end of the list.
Latvia’s result is 50.7 out of 100.
Raubiško noted that people that flee from Ukraine are under a special temporary protection regime, which may include a different list of legal conditions for integration. However, indexes included in the study allow for an evaluation of integration infrastructure and how comprehensive the government’s refugee integration strategy really is.
Migration Policy Group’s vice-director and co-author of the report Aleksandrs Volfhards stresses that the report indicates stagnation in countries’ refugee integration systems. In some cases experts have noticed regress in several EU member states in the last two years.
«It is important for this report to provide a roadmap for these countries, including those that receive a large number of Ukrainian refugees, to properly plan specific activities to implement in order to organise an inclusive policy that would make integration of new refugees run smoother,» said Volfhards.
In addition to multiple conclusions, the report also points out a connection between countries that have an inclusive integration policy and refugees’ welfare during Covid-19 pandemic.
The report mentions that since the last NIEM report two years ago, 14 analysed countries have not made almost any progress. Many countries have even regressed somewhat, especially in reception, housing and social security. Some progress has been observed in citizenship, cooperation, family reuniting, language teaching and social orientation.
The report indicates that a comparison of existing regulations on housing and equal access, all countries have problems with active integration support policies, cross-sectoral coordination and government support of civil society and local institutions. As for Covid-19 pandemic, countries that have more inclusive integration systems generally show better results with reducing influence of Covid-19 on refugees.
The report about Latvia mentions that the country’s international air recipients integration system not experience any major changes between 2019 and 2021.
Two unexpected shocks – Covid-19 pandemic and the arrival of migrants in Latvia through Belarus – had once again outlined multiple lasting problems: the lack of coordination with the country’s integration policy and insufficient integration of different sectors, inequality in social support between two different categories of recipients of international protection and the lack of housing support.