The reach and impact of migration information campaigns in 25 communities across Africa and Asia

Based on survey data from nearly 13,000 young adults, the research finds that while migration information campaigns—primarily those warning against migrating—have significant reach in many African and Asian communities, they generally fail to reduce migration aspirations. In some instances, exposure to these warnings is actually associated with a higher desire to migrate.

• Exposure to migration information varies significantly by location, with between 4 per cent and 86 per cent of young adults in the surveyed areas having seen or heard such information in the past year.
• The most prevalent message in these campaigns is a warning against migrating, which is the dominant message recalled by people in the surveyed low- and middle-income communities.
• Television was the most common information channel in 14 research areas, while social media or websites were most common in 8 areas, and radio was most common in the remaining 3.
• Multivariate logistic regressions indicate that exposure to warnings against migrating has no discernible effect on either the preference or readiness to migrate, regardless of the number of communication channels used.
• In most cases where warnings against migrating did show an effect at the local level, they were more likely to increase migration aspirations than to decrease them, with Baidoa (SOM2) being the only area where warnings consistently lowered aspirations.
• Certain individual factors are strongly associated with higher migration aspirations, including higher educational attainment, awareness of other migrants, knowledge of failed migration experiences, and receiving remittances.

APA

Caso, N., & Carling, J. (2024). The reach and impact of migration information campaigns in 25 communities across Africa and Asia. Peace Research Institute Oslo. https://cdn.cloud.prio.org/files/7bd52170-8f4b-443e-b0d5-8d13629ed50e/Caso and Carling 2024 Migration information campaigns.pdf?inline=true

Chicago

Caso, Nicolás, and Jørgen Carling. The reach and impact of migration information campaigns in 25 communities across Africa and Asia. Peace Research Institute Oslo, 2024. https://cdn.cloud.prio.org/files/7bd52170-8f4b-443e-b0d5-8d13629ed50e/Caso and Carling 2024 Migration information campaigns.pdf?inline=true.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |last1=Caso |first1=Nicolás |last2=Carling |first2=Jørgen |title=The reach and impact of migration information campaigns in 25 communities across Africa and Asia |publisher=Peace Research Institute Oslo |date=March 2024 |url=https://cdn.cloud.prio.org/files/7bd52170-8f4b-443e-b0d5-8d13629ed50e/Caso and Carling 2024 Migration information campaigns.pdf?inline=true |access-date=23 October 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{caso2024reach, author = {Caso, Nicolás and Carling, Jørgen}, title = {{The reach and impact of migration information campaigns in 25 communities across Africa and Asia}}, institution = {Peace Research Institute Oslo}, year = {2024}, month = mar, url = {https://cdn.cloud.prio.org/files/7bd52170-8f4b-443e-b0d5-8d13629ed50e/Caso and Carling 2024 Migration information campaigns.pdf?inline=true}, urldate = {2026-10-23}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }