In Ifrane, the debates on migration and development continued on 18 and 19 May, as part of the 6th international conference devoted to this theme and whose proceedings were launched last Thursday in Rabat.

A purely scientific and academic event during which a range of researchers from different nationalities met at Al Akhawayn University to share their reflections on the migration issue with Moroccan officials and specialists in order to take them into account in the vision being developed for our fellow citizens abroad.

The Moroccan minister in charge of this department finds that “policies aimed at controlling migration should be complementary”. For Abdellatif Maâzouz, who also recalled the partnership between Morocco and the European Union, particularly in its component relating to international mobility, development should be conceived as a solidarity-based process that takes human skills into account. Hence the interest, according to some participants in the various workshops scheduled during the conference, in opting for circular migration which could constitute a solution to the brain drain phenomenon. This concept of circular migration, which currently seems abstract and which tends to gain momentum, consists among other things of constantly facilitating migration abroad, easy return to the country of origin and so on.

This being said, students constitute, according to some participants in the debate, the most qualified category in the migration process. Education in the destination country being one of the attractive factors.

Especially since the return remains closely linked to the study options made abroad. Also, the mentality and the will of these migrants constitute in a way elements contributing to the return of these communities to their country of origin.

From these observations, the migratory phenomenon is marked by meanders that make it a relatively abstract and complex issue. Even so, the participants in the 6th international conference on migration and development, which is, let us remember, organised under the High Patronage of HM King Mohammed VI, by the World Bank research group,

the ministry in charge of MREs, the Marseille Centre for Mediterranean Integration, the French Development Agency and the Center for Global Development, have attempted to make their contribution so that the Moroccan authorities can see clearly!