Migration Outpace Global Population, Says Research Group (Image@Pixabay)

The US-based Pew Research Center has found that people born in the minor religious groups of their country often migrate to places where their religion is common. It says people who are from the majority religious groups are often reluctant to migrate.

The research found that the number of people living outside their country of birth rose by 83% between 1990 and 2020, which is from 153 million to 281 million. Migration during this period outpaced growth in the global population, which rose by 47% to 7.8 billion people.

According to the study, over 80% of people in India are Hindu, but they form only 41% of emigrants from the country. At the same time, about 15% of people living in India are Muslim, compared with 33% of those who were born in India and now live elsewhere. While Christians constitute to only 2% of the Indian population, 16% who have left India are Christian.

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The study found that more than 280 million people, or 3.6% of the world’s population, are international migrants. Anyone living outside their birthplace, from babies to oldest adults, are included in the analysis of migrant population.

Christians comprised 47% of the global migrant population, Muslims 29%, Hindus 5%, Buddhists 4% and Jews 1%, as of 2020, according to Pew Research Center’s analysis of UN data and 270 censuses and surveys.

Buddhist and Muslim migrants more than doubled between 1990 and 2020.  Other groups of migrants grew more modestly – Christians by 80%, the religiously unaffiliated by 67%, Hindus by 48% and Jews by 28%, said the study.

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While Muslim migrants increased from 39.9 million to 80.4 million (up 102%), making up to between 24% and 29% of migrants globally, Buddhist migrants grew from 4.6 million to 10.9 million (up 137%), which is a 3% to 4% of the international migrant population.

At the same time, Christian migrants grew from 72.7 million in to 130.9 million in 2020 – an 80% increase. Over the decades, Christian migrants worldwide ranged from 47% to 49%. Hindu migrants increased from 9.1 million to 13.5 million (up 48%), making up to 5% and 6% of the world’s migrant population consistently. Jewish migrants grew from 2.3 million to 3.0 million (up 28%), which is constitute to between 1% and 2% of global migrant population. Religiously unaffiliated migrants grew from 21.8 million to 36.4 million (up 67%), which is estimated to be between 13% to 15% of international migrants .