Launched in December 2016 with the support of the EUTF for Africa, the EU-IOM Joint Initiative is the first comprehensive programme bringing together African countries, IOM and the EU around the shared aim of ensuring that migration is safer, more informed and better governed for both migrants and their communities. 

Migrants may face significant risk and protection issues in transit or host countries. The EU-IOM Joint Initiative aims to save lives and improve assistance for migrants along migration routes. It allows migrants who decide to return to their countries of origin to do so in a safe and dignified way, in full respect of their rights. It provides reintegration support to enable returning migrants to restart their lives in their countries and communities of origin through an integrated approach, including individual assistance, community-based support and structural interventions. 

As a returnee’s ability to successfully reintegrate is influenced by the political, institutional, environmental, economic and social conditions in his/her country of origin, the EU-IOM Joint Initiative contributes to reinforcing systems and enhancing migration governance, in complementarity with local development.

Pillars of Action 

1. CAPACITY BUILDING
   Promote good migration governance by strengthening capacities of local state and non-state actors in the countries where we work.
2. PROTECTION AND VOLUNTARY RETURN ASSISTANCE*
   Ensure that migrants enjoy rights and access to services, provide direct support and facilitate the voluntary return of migrants.
3. REINTEGRATION SUPPORT
   Address returnees’ economic, social and psychosocial needs, foster the inclusion of communities of return and strengthen systems for reintegration support. 

*In Libya, only Pillars 2 and 3 apply. While there is no reintegration assistance in Libya (as there is no return assistance to Libya), migrants returning from Libya to countries where there is no EU-funded reintegration assistance programme are eligible to receive a reintegration assistance package from the project.

Launched in December 2016 with the support of the EUTF for Africa, the EU-IOM Joint Initiative is the first comprehensive programme bringing together African countries, IOM and the EU around the shared aim of ensuring that migration is safer, more informed and better governed for both migrants and their communities.

Migrants may face significant risk and protection issues in transit or host countries. The EU-IOM Joint Initiative aims to save lives and improve assistance for migrants along migration routes. It allows migrants who decide to return to their countries of origin to do so in a safe and dignified way, in full respect of their rights. It provides reintegration support to enable returning migrants to restart their lives in their countries and communities of origin through an integrated approach, including individual assistance, community-based support and structural interventions.

As a returnee’s ability to successfully reintegrate is influenced by the political, institutional, environmental, economic and social conditions in his/her country of origin, the EU-IOM Joint Initiative contributes to reinforcing systems and enhancing migration governance, in complementarity with local development.

Pillars of Action 

1. CAPACITY BUILDING
   Promote good migration governance by strengthening capacities of local state and non-state actors in the countries where we work.
2. PROTECTION AND VOLUNTARY RETURN ASSISTANCE
   Ensure that migrants enjoy rights and access to services, provide direct support and facilitate the voluntary return of migrants.
3. REINTEGRATION SUPPORT
   Address returnees’ economic, social and psychosocial needs, foster the inclusion of communities of return and strengthen systems for reintegration support.
4. MIGRATION DATA COLLECTION AND ANALYSIS
   Support evidence-based policies and programme design by strengthening migration data on migratory movements and migrants’ needs and vulnerabilities.
5. INFORMATION AND AWARENESS RAISING
   Enable migrants and potential migrants to make informed decisions about their migratory journey and sensitize communities on migration.

Launched in December 2016 with the support of the EUTF for Africa, the EU-IOM Joint Initiative is the first comprehensive programme bringing together African countries, IOM and the EU around the shared aim of ensuring that migration is safer, more informed and better governed for both migrants and their communities.

Migrants may face significant risk and protection issues in transit or host countries. The EU-IOM Joint Initiative aims to save lives and improve assistance for migrants along migration routes. It allows migrants who decide to return to their countries of origin to do so in a safe and dignified way, in full respect of their rights. It provides reintegration support to enable returning migrants to restart their lives in their countries and communities of origin through an integrated approach, including individual assistance, community-based support and structural interventions.

As a returnee’s ability to successfully reintegrate is influenced by the political, institutional, environmental, economic and social conditions in his/her country of origin, the EU-IOM Joint Initiative contributes to reinforcing systems and enhancing migration governance, in complementarity with local development.

Pillars of Action:

1. CAPACITY BUILDING
   Promote good migration governance by strengthening capacities of local state and non-state actors in the countries where we work.
2. PROTECTION AND VOLUNTARY RETURN ASSISTANCE
   Ensure that migrants enjoy rights and access to services, provide direct support and facilitate the voluntary return of migrants.
3. REINTEGRATION SUPPORT
   Address returnees’ economic, social and psychosocial needs, foster the inclusion of communities of return and strengthen systems for reintegration support. 
4. MIGRATION DATA COLLECTION AND ANALYSIS
   Support evidence-based policies and programme design by strengthening migration data on migratory movements and migrants’ needs and vulnerabilities.
5. INFORMATION AND AWARENESS RAISING
   Enable migrants and potential migrants to make informed decisions about their migratory journey and sensitize communities on migration.
6. COMMUNITY STABILIZATION
   Contribute to the stabilization of communities at risk by revitalizing the local economy, improving access to basic socio-economic infrastructures and attempting to strengthen social cohesion. 

Launched in March 2017 with funding from the European Commission’s Directorate-General for International Development and Cooperation (DG DEVCO). The Pilot Action is developed in the context of EU-IOM External Actions with an aim to contribute to the development of voluntary return and sustainable community-based reintegration approaches in South Africa as a host country and Malawi and Mozambique as countries of origin.

The specific objectives of the Pilot Action are:

1. To support targeted countries of origin, transit and destination to enhance national structures and capacities to facilitate a dignified and sustainable return and reintegration process; 
2. To support national authorities of targeted countries in the provision of dignified voluntary return assistance to stranded and vulnerable migrants; 
3. To support targeted countries to enhance the sustainability of returnees’ economic, social and psychosocial reintegration through tailored individual and community-level assistance.

Beyond activities in Southern Africa, the project includes a global component – the EU-IOM Knowledge Management Hub (KMH) that was established in late 2017.

The KMH’s aim is to strengthen learning across return and reintegration programmes, and support the harmonization of approaches, processes and tools under the EU–IOM Actions in support of migrant protection and reintegration.

The KMH’s activities revolve around four inter-connected components:

• Ensuring Coherent Voluntary Return and Reintegration Approaches: Standardization of approaches and practices, including through capacity building, to ensure coherence among programmes and adherence to IOM global guidelines, as well as to avoid fragmentation of approaches and practices and improve opportunities for collaboration.
• Harmonising Monitoring and Evaluation Activities: Support of the harmonization of cross-regional monitoring and evaluation activities among the EU-IOM Actions to ensure availability of reliable data allowing for comparative analysis across regions, particularly in the field of reintegration sustainability, feeding into evidence-based programming.
• Setting up Knowledge Management Tools: Set-up of knowledge management tools such as webinars, cross-regional knowledge sharing workshops, and a multi-faceted Return and Reintegration Platform with a variety of tools to view, share, learn, and discuss research and best practices, including the community of practice and repository of resources.
• Producing Knowledge Products: Generation of knowledge products to address knowledge gaps and enhance evidence-based programming. These include: Research Fund allowing to commission studies addressing understudied topics as well as other publications sharing findings from the reintegration data analysis, taking stock of the state of the art in various areas related to reintegration assistance and proposing leads for future programmes, and sharing reintegration initiatives that can be replicated or adapted elsewhere.

The project activities in Southern Africa were phased out in 2020 and as of January 2021, the project’s focus is on the global KMH component.

The overall objective of the project is to contribute to the sustainable reintegration of returnees and the progressive achievement of Sustainable Development Goal 10.7 to facilitate orderly, safe, regular and responsible migration and mobility of people, including through the implementation of planned and well-managed policies in Bangladesh. The specific objectives (SO) of the project are to ensure that;
 

• SO, 1: Irregular migrants returning to Bangladesh are sustainably reintegrated (Sustainable Reintegration component)

• SO, 2: The capacities of the Government of Bangladesh and other migration actors are strengthened to manage migration at central and local levels and to ensure reintegration of irregular migrants (Migration Governance component)

• SO, 3: Returning Migrants, aspirant migrants, families, communities and local government and private sector actors make informed decisions about migration, and practice and promote safe, orderly and regular migration behaviours, including remittance management (Awareness raising component).

IOM developed the Reintegration and Development Assistance in Afghanistan (RADA) project to support sustainable reintegration of returnees within their communities of return.  RADA’s overall objective is to contribute to the progressive achievement of SDG 10.7, “to facilitate orderly, safe, regular and responsible migration and mobility of people, including through the implementation of planned and well-managed policies”. To achieve the overall objective, IOM will support returnees and refugees from EU Member States and non-EU countries, as well as host communities in Afghanistan. Throughout this action, IOM will directly support individual returnees from European and non-European countries (i.e. Turkey) and Afghan households in communities of high return. The action will also indirectly benefit communities of high return in Afghanistan by fostering local development, for example through the construction of community infrastructure and irrigation canals, but as well by activities focusing on social and psychosocial well-being and reintegration, overall contributing to an enabling environment shared by returnees and host communities. RADA is being implemented in eight provinces, Balkh, Baghlan, Kabul, Kunar, Kandahar, Herat, Laghman and Nangarhar.

Overall objective:

To contribute to the progressive achievement of SDG 10.7, “to facilitate orderly, safe, regular and responsible migration and mobility of people, including through the implementation of planned and well-managed policies”. 

Specific objective:

To support Afghan returnees, their families and host communities towards sustainable reintegration in Afghanistan.

RADA has 4 result areas:

1. Programmatic activities fostering sustainable reintegration
2. Programmatic activities fostering capacity strengthening
3. Reception assistance for individual returnees
4. Knowledge and evidence development (through M&E, Reintegration Index and policy research)