From brain drain to brain circulation:

Leveraging S&T diasporas

Observations for Colombia

Yevgeny Kuznetsov

Senior Research Fellow

Migration Policy Institute

Washington DC

WORKSHOP INTERNACIONAL DE LA DIÁSPORA CIENTÍFICA COLOMBIANA EN NORTEAMÉRICA

December 5, 2013 Cambridge, MA

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Development, WBI

Roadmap

I. Impact of the diaspora of the

highly skilled

II. Lessons of S&T diaspora

initiatives

III. Emerging good practice

Market for the highly skilled

Will become even more globally integrated

Increasing returns to skills will continue to favor spatial concentration: clustering phenomenon

The brain drain will increase, both from developed and developing countries

Expansion of far-flung skilled diasporas – networks of talent abroad

Motivation

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Top Skilled Emigration Countries

1 ………… 1,051,885

2 INDIA 996,813

3 PHILIPPINES 886,653

4 GERMANY 855,815

5 CHINA 799,834

6 MEXICO 473,923

7 S. KOREA 425,152

8 CANADA 419,554

9 USA 370,400

10 VIETNAM 342,744

11 FRANCE 338,074

12 POLAND 276,975

13 JAPAN 276,821

14 TAIWAN 263,086

15 IRAN 260,270

16 USSR-RUS 256,229

17 ITA 246,581

18 CUBA 221,051

19 ALGERIA 215,108

20 MAROCCO 209,436

21 UKRAINE 206,471

22 PAKISTAN 202,659

23 PRI 193,112

24 JAM 190,712

25 IRLAN 176,641

26 NETH. 174,191

27 COLOMBIA 171,759

28 S. AFRICA 157,601

29 ROMANIA 151,831

30 HNG KONG 147,115

31 EGYPT `

Stock of tertiary-educated foreign-born residents in OECD (2000)

All countries of origin

1 ………… 1,051,885

2 INDIA 996,813

3 PHILIPPINES 886,653

4 GERMANY 855,815

5 CHINA 799,834

6 MEXICO 473,923

7 S. KOREA 425,152

14 TAIWAN 263,086

15 IRAN 260,270

16 USSR-RUS 256,229

27 COLOMBIA 171,579 40 ARGENTINA 105,211

67 CHILE 62,072

Be productively employed in the country: growth of clusters and non-traditional exports

Leave the country and be lost for it: brain drain

Leave the country yet be engaged in projects at home: brain circulation

Leave and come back: return migration

Some Scenarios for Skills

Diversity of Skills

Scientific

Technical

Medical professionals

Entrepreneurial and managerial

Cultural

Tacit skills (not necessarily requiring higher education)

(and respective Diaspora networks and initiatives )

Common Mistakes

Preoccupation with the return of skills: physical reallocation to home countries

Preoccupation with one high-profile category – scientists (or doctors)

Instead:

Trigger brain circulation: create joint projects with skills abroad. The return may come as a „next step‟ Focus also on business and technical talent Possibility of a self-reinforcing virtuous cycle

Example of a virtuous cycle

Incremental Institutional Development:

Emergence of venture capital industry in Taiwan

Massive foreign education and brain drain in the 60‟s and

70‟s

Industry and financial sector dominated by large firms.

Culture of risk-taking and experimentation virtually non-

existing

Silicon Valley as a role model: successful entrepreneurs from

Diaspora and the government decide to promote venture

capital industry

First venture capital fund is established. Government

contributes to equity. Expatriates reallocate to Taiwan to

manage the Fund. Diaspora in Silicon Valley open up market

Demonstration effect of the success triggers establishment of

other funds

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Taiwan: An Example

Taiwan Technology Workers

Source: Annalee Saxenian, University of California, Berkeley

Taiwan Technology Workers

Chile: Developing a biotechnology industry

In 1997 Ramón L. García, a Chilean applied geneticist and

biotechnology entrepreneur with a PhD from the University of

Iowa, contacted Fundación Chile, a Chilean private-public entity

charged with technology transfer. Ramón is the CEO of InterLink

Biotechnologies, a Princeton, New York-based, company he co-

founded in 1991. After jointly reviewing their portfolios of

initiatives, Fundación and Interlink founded a new, co-owned

company to undertake long-term R&D projects. These projects

are needed to transfer technologies to Chile that are key to the

continuing competitiveness of its rapidly growing agribusiness

sector. Without Ramón‟s combination of deep knowledge of

Chile, advanced US education, exposure to US managerial

practice and experience as an entrepreneur, the new company

would have been inconceivable.

Remittances

Donations

Investments

Knowledge & Innovation

Hierarchy of Diaspora Impact

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Development, WBI

Institutional

Reform

Studies, conference, and databases vs. projects that last

„Tiny flowers blooming‟: a lot of promise once tiny but then hit the wall

Projects of philanthropic nature and financial transfers

Excitement with technology: digital networks

Focus on matchmaking. But the opportunities need to be created before one can match anything

Institutional fragility: once individual champions are gone, the program becomes a „living dead‟

First Generation of Diasporas

Initiatives

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Why diaspora initiatives often disappoint?

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Easy to start:

a lot enthusiasm

More difficult

to maintain momentum:

enthusiasm

tends to evaporate

A need to

create win-win situations

Key Constraints and Emerging Good Practice

Domestic institutions as the constraint, never the strength, enthusiasm and creativity of diaspora But domestic institutions are heterogeneous: some are (much) better than others Institutionalizing ‘brain circulation’: introducing a procedure to identify and support dynamic domestic institutions and champions who rely on diaspora talent Contest between domestic organizations for joint projects as one example Colombia and Vietnam S&T projects; Mexico and Russia as a new form of leveraging of S&T talent for domestic innovation

14

Role of the Government

Three-prong approach:

“Cultivating the Soil”:

Create platforms for collaboration, typically with a sophisticated on-line portal

“Planting the seeds”:

Facilitate a diversity of initiatives from the bottom-up („let one thousand flowers bloom‟)

“Facilitating a micro-climate”:

Provide a framework for information sharing and lessons-learning

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Development, WBI

Initiatives

Cultivating the soil: Collaborative platforms Advance: Australia's Global Community

http://advance.org/

Kea: New Zealand‟s Global Network

http://www.keanewzealand.com/

Planting the seeds and facilitating a micro-climate Contest between domestic knowledge organizations to leverage diaspora members for long-term projects. Examples: Russia, Mexico.

Contest between diaspora members to promote both short-term visits and long-term mobility: Croatia

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Conclusions

1. Diasporas can be very useful for home countries but to

develop their potential, concerted effort is required. This

concerted effort takes time.

2. Institutions at home, not diaspora‟ commitment is the

binding constraints everywhere.

3. In the short term, individual champions and tangible

success stories (demonstration effects) are the key.

4. In the longer-term, institutions of the home countries are

the key (diasporas are not a panacea)

5. Focus on pragmatism: relying on individual

champions to develop institutions in home countries