Community statistics on migration and international protection

PURPOSE: to enable the development of common asylum and immigration statistics.

LEGISLATIVE ACT: Regulation (EC) No 862/2007 of the European Parliament and of the Council on Community statistics on migration and international protection and repealing Council Regulation (EEC) No 311/76 on the compilation of statistics on foreign workers

CONTENT: the Council adopted a Regulation establishing common rules for the collection and compilation of Community statistics on migration and international protection with a view to contributing to the development of effective EU policies on migration. The new rules aim at harmonising the different EU Member States' mechanisms for producing statistics relating to migration issues in order better to develop, implement and monitor common immigration and asylum legislation. They seek also to reinforce the exchange of statistical data on asylum and migration and to improve the quality of Community statistical collections and outputs which have, hitherto, been compiled on the basis of informal agreements between Member States.

Accordingly, the Regulation establishes common rules for the collection and compilation of Community statistics on:

• immigration to and emigration from the Member State territories, including flows from the territory of one Member State to that of another Member State and flows between a Member State and the territory of a third country;
• the citizenship and country of birth of persons usually resident in the territory of the Member States;
• administrative and judicial procedures and processes in the Member States relating to immigration, granting of permission to reside, citizenship, asylum and other forms of international protection and the prevention of illegal immigration.

Member States shall report to Eurostat on the use and probable effects of estimations or other methods of adapting statistics based on national definitions to comply with the harmonised definitions set out in this Regulation. For the reference year 2008, the statistics supplied to Eurostat may be based on alternative (national) definitions.

Member States must provide Eurostat with the following in the detail specified in the Regulation:

• statistics on international migration, usually resident population and acquisition of citizenship;
• statistics on international protection;
• statistics on the prevention of illegal entry and stay;
• statistics on residence permits and residence of third-country nationals;
• statistics on returns.

It should be noted that the recitals specify the following:

- the Regulation does not cover estimates of the number of persons illegally resident in the Member States. Member States should not provide such estimates or data on such persons to the Commission although they may be included in population stocks due to surveys;

- wherever possible, the definitions used for the purposes of this Regulation are taken from the United Nations Recommendations on Statistics of International Migration, the United Nations Recommendations for the Censuses of Population and Housing in the ECE Region or EC legislation, and should be updated following the relevant procedures.

The Regulation provides a framework which needs to be completed through the adoption of implementing measures in the form of Commission Regulations. The European Statistical System will be actively involved in the preparation and implementation of such measures which are expected to be adopted in 2008.

Report: by 20 August 2012 and every three years thereafter, the Commission shall submit a report to the European Parliament and the Council on the statistics compiled pursuant to the Regulation and on their quality.

This Regulation shall repeal Regulation (EEC) No 311/76.

ENTRY INTO FORCE : 20/08/2007.