Peculiarities of Georgian Population’s Emigration during the Post-Communist Period

Avtandili Sulaberidze , georgian
Joseph Archvadze, Ilia State University
Nino Gomelauri, Ilia State University
Vladimer Sulaberidze, Ilia State Unoiversity

In the period after Georgia gained independence, population’s migratory behavior and intensity, in quantitative and qualitative terms as well as with its immensity, was clearly distinct from the factors which stipulated the population’s migratory behavior that existed in the “closed territory” during the Communist period. After acquiring independence, besides ethnic factors and displacement (refugees from Abkhazia and South Ossetia), the basic reasons behind the high-scale illegal emigration abroad were a high level of unemployment in Georgia and the need to improve one’s economic condition due to family poverty. Emigration from Georgia, besides economic factors, is also associated with such social-demographic factors of migration as are: receiving education, status of a refugee, wish to live together with family members, etc. As a result of the high level of illegal emigration and low level of natural increase in the course of 1992-2018, the population of Georgia decreased by 1/3 and amounted to 3.17 million individuals in 2018. It must be noted that since 2017 a kind of new “impetus” was given to the process of illegal emigration from Georgia by the introduction of visa free regime with the countries of the EU, which is limited to 90 days. In accordance with the results of sociological research, there is a high probability that a fairly large portion of youth will remain abroad. From among the interviewed students’ 42.7% plan on going abroad, among these, 49.8% intend to return to their homeland; Therefore, emigratory processes remain to be a challenge for Georgia.

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 Presented in Session P3. Poster Session Migration, Economics, Environment, Methods, History and Policy