The algorithm analyses age, gender, skills to find suitable relocation place. FOTOSEARCH
American and European scientists are testing a new algorithm
that would ease resettlement of refugees and boost their chances of
finding employment.
In a paper published in Science
last week, scientists say the algorithm analyses biographical factors
including age, gender, language skills, and country of origin of the
immigrant, to find the best location to resettle a refugee in any given
country, and improve their chances of getting a job by as much as 70 per
cent.
The process of resettling involves feeding the
algorithm with key factors, such as capacity at resettlement agencies at
each location, the algorithm the uses a series of models trained to
predict where a refugee is likely to fare best based on previous cases.
The
model WAS developed by Jens Hainmueller, a professor in the Department
of Political Science at Stanford University, and Kirk Bansak, a PhD
candidate at Stanford’s Immigration Policy Lab.
The
decision on the final re-settlement location for refugees would still be
made by a resettlement officer, but those decisions will be informed by
the data sorted by the algorithm.
Historical data
The researchers, who used the technology to study historical
data on refugee resettlement in the United States and Switzerland, found
that eventually the economic self-sufficiency of refugees depended on a
combination of their individual biographical characteristics and where
they were resettled within the country.
According to
the findings, refugees with certain skills or background achieved better
outcomes in some locations than others, and likelihood of an individual
refugee finding employment could be roughly doubled by implementing the
algorithm assigned placements for refugees.
“Host
countries’ current procedures for determining how to allocate refugees
across domestic resettlement sites do not fully leverage synergies
between refugees and geographic locations,” the researchers said in the
report.
Solving refugee problem
While
the technology is yet to be deployed in real life, the researchers
believe it could help solve the world’s refugee problem which hit crisis
levels in 2016 with about 65.6 million people forcibly displaced
worldwide.
According to the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR),
sub-Saharan Africa hosts more than 26 per cent of the world’s refugee
population with over 18 million people in the region marked as of
concern to UNHCR.
More than 2.25 million South
Sudanese refugees fled their war-torn country to neighbouring Uganda,
Kenya, Ethiopia and Sudan as at July 2017, with thousands estimated to
cross the border to Uganda every day.
In November 2013, Kenya, Somalia and the UNHCR signed a tripartite agreement for the voluntary repatriation of Somali refugees living in Kenya but the process has been slow due to several challenges including lack of resources, insecurity in Somalia and opposition by human rights groups.
In November 2013, Kenya, Somalia and the UNHCR signed a tripartite agreement for the voluntary repatriation of Somali refugees living in Kenya but the process has been slow due to several challenges including lack of resources, insecurity in Somalia and opposition by human rights groups.
More
than 150,000 people are said to attempt to reach Europe through Libya —
the main gateway — by sea annually for the last three years, but most of
them end up as slaves in Libya due to increased anti-immigration
efforts in Europe.
No comments :
Post a Comment