I swear to God I would cry just like a little child. Figures published in 1990 by International Migration illustrate the steady increase in the number of Egyptian migrants to Arab oil-producing countries between 1969 and 1979. The rate of increase was largest between 1970 and 1972 after which migration continued to grow, though at a more moderate rate. Although labour migration would continue to grow after 1982, the number of migrants remained below its record high in 1979. The latest figure released by the Ministry of Labour and Manpower puts the current total of Egyptian migrant workers at over two million, 1.3 million of whom are in the Arab Gulf.
Labour migration happens when there is a market that expels and a market that wants.
A World Bank study quoted by the Land Centre for Human Rights indicates that the real wages of agricultural workers decreased by 60 per cent between 1985 and 1996, while figures covering the ten year period between 1988-1998 indicate that rural unemployment has increased at a higher rate than urban unemployment. Public sector jobs acted to accelerate labour migration from rural to urban areas. However, as indicated in a 1997 paper by Barry McCormick and Jackline Wahba, this sector, which had already absorbed 35 per cent of the work force, could no longer sustain the strain. By 1987 the waiting period was five years for university graduates and six years for secondary school graduates. Labour migration undoubtedly relieved social and economic pressures at home.