The project is being led by Coventry University’s Centre for Trust, Peace and Social Relations.

The UKRI GCRF South-South Migration, Inequality and Development Hub will see CMS joined forces with universities and organisations from across the world to explore how the movement of people in the Global South, is affecting inequality and development in less developed regions.

Professor Heaven Crawley, an expert in international migration at Coventry University and the lead of the Hub’s network of partners, announced this at the launch of the hub project prior to an inception workshop of UKRI GCRF South-South Migration, Inequality and Development Hub in Accra.

She said over the next five years, the Hub would work with governments, international agencies, partners and NGOs on the ground in these countries and around the globe to maximize the benefits of South-South migration for development as well as investigate how it contributes to the delivery of UN Sustainable Development Goals one and 10 – ending poverty and reducing inequality.

“The Hub, will explore South-South migration in six global corridors linking origin and destination countries, focusing in particular on the following routes: Nepal-Malaysia; China –Ghana, Burkina Faso-Cote D’Ivoire; Ethiopia-South Africa; Hiati-Brazil; and Egypt-Jordan,” she added.

The Hub’s network of partners includes 20 leading universities, as well as the Overseas Development Institute, PositiveNegatives, Samuel Hall and @iLaBAfrica; six international organisations and numerous local organisations in 12 countries in which the hub will work.

Prof Teye, who is also one of the three co-directors of the Hub, said the CMS is working on Ghana–China Corridor where they would be looking at migration flow from China, what they are engaged in, look at issues of inequalities generated through migration and how the benefits of migration could be harnessed.

He said they were considering looking at three sectors–migration into the small scale mining sector, the migration processes and interactions with Ghanaians around issues of mining, Chinese and the trade sector of Ghana, their investments flow to Ghana and remittances from Ghana to China and Chinese in construction sector.

Prof Teye said the project would also look at how to develop policies to ensure that South-South migration, reduces inequalities in development of the two countries rather than widening inequalities.

“We have a policy engagement component where they will engage policy makers to see which intervention will work better if you want to harness the benefits of migration,” he said, adding that, migration if managed well, could be used to promote economic transformation in both receiving and country of origin.

He said they also have a capacity building component for communities affected by migration.

South-South migration is estimated to account for nearly half of all international migration, up to 70 per cent in some places but its potential benefits have been undermined by limited and unequal access to rights and to the economic and social opportunities that migrations can bring.