Ireland has long been known for emigration with an “E” which refers to the longstanding trend or people leaving Ireland to live elsewhere in countries around the world.
Ireland recently released a report on immigration with an “I,” as in people arriving in Ireland.
People continue to leave Ireland, but the new trend is that a larger number of new people are arriving there to live.
The arrival of these new residents is documented by the Dublin-based Economic and Social Research Institute in recently released a report called The Annual Report on Migration and Asylum 2022: Ireland. ( https://www.esri.ie/system/files/publications/SUSTAT124_0.pdf )
A census of the population conducted in April 2022 found the population of Ireland was 5.184 million, the highest population on record since 1841.
Ireland’s Central Statistics Office estimates that the population grew nearly another 100,00 over the ensuing 12 months to 5.282 million as of April 2023.
Ireland’s population is growing, and a significant contributor is the arrival of new residents.
There were 85,793 of these so-called “first-residence permits” issued in 2022, which was the highest over the last ten years.
Overall Ireland had 234,057 of these new resident permits at the end of 2022.
In 2022, the most common nationality of residence permit holders was Indian (24%), followed by Brazilian (15%) and Chinese (7%).
Education was the most common reason for permits, accounting for 48%, followed by ‘other reasons’ at 24%, and employment at 23%.
Immigration into Ireland rose significantly in the year ending April 2023, with 141,600 immigrants, a 31% increase from 12 months earlier.
Departures through emigration also continued to increase, with 64,000 people leaving in the year through April 2023, a 14% increase from the previous year.
This produced a net migration into Ireland of 77,600, a 50% increase from the year before.
Overarching developments include Ireland opting into the Asylum, Migration and Integration Fund (AMIF) Regulation, a European Union (EU) fund that aims to build migration management capacity and procedures for migration management.
Following the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 and the subsequent war, the Temporary Protection Directive was activated on March 4, 2022, for the first time.
Temporary protection is an exceptional measure to provide immediate and temporary protection in the event of a mass influx of displaced persons who are unable to return to their country of origin. As of last December, 67,448 people had arrived in Ireland from Ukraine under this directive.
What’s happening in Ireland is happening throughout the European Union. As of January 2022, the 6.2 percent of third-country nationals living in Ireland were comparable to the 7.6 percent in Germany, 7.7 percent in Spain, 5.6 percent in France, and 6.2 percent in Italy.
CITIZENSHIP AND STATELESSNESS
A total of 17,188 applications for Irish citizenship were made in 2022, the highest since 2013 and a 44% increase from 2021. The number of certificates issued was also at its highest level since 2014, with a 39% increase from 2021 to 13,605.
The UK was the most common country of origin.
