Two obvious barriers to integration of Venezuelan refugees and migrants in Brazil, that we could not control for in our estimation due to data limitations, are language barriers and xenophobia. The official language of Brazil is Portuguese, while the mother tongue of Venezuelans is Spanish. Consequently, language barrier may partially explain not only the downgrading in grades and occupations, but also lower enrollment rate in _Cadastro Unico_<sup>_ ́_</sup> . Hostility toward refugees and migrants is another barrier. Brazil ranks 50<sup>_th_</sup> in the migrant acceptance index (Esipova et al., 2017), published by Gallup Poll, below many of the other Latin American host countries, so it is likely that xenophobia against Venezuelans may hinder their integration. However, our data does not provide any information on that. The results of the Venezuelans not being sufficiently rewarded for their human capital provides some evidence of discrimination, but it may also point to productivity loss due to other factors like being fluent in Portuguese that we did not control for in the estimation. However, the results point out that occupational downgrading is higher among Venezuelans suggesting di↵erential treatment. Figure 14 shows that the wage gaps between the observed Venezuelan wage and their predicted wage if they are rewarded equally for their endowments as Brazilians and controlling for selection to waged employment are substantial specially at the fundamental<sup>31</sup> and the high school level.

Our results suggest certain policy implications that may accelerate inclusion of Venezuelan refugees and migrants and their children in Brazil. These policy implications include:

- Facilitation of the process of credential and skill verification and validation - This will subdue downgrading in both schools and the formal labor market.

- Strengthen voluntary relocation to areas within Brazil that have more job opportunities - The federal government, along with UNHCR and other civil society have been implementing a program like this since 2018.

- Provision of language training may help children to enroll in school at the grade, commensurate with their age and also promote employability of Venezuelan adults.

- Development of labor intermediation services focusing on language training, Venezuelan community outreach and specialized counsellors, who know employers where language is less a factor or looking for particular skill sets as suggested in Mazza (2017).

- Increased capacity of schools through holding di↵erent shifts can reduce overcrowding.

- Stronger labor market activation programs to include job intermediation and skills and language training to help in overcoming search barriers and matching friction.

- Continue provision of information assistance for documents issuances and enrollment to education, health and social assistance services and benefits and inform Venezuelan refugees and migrants of their social rights and guarantee access.

It should be noted here that results reported in this paper do not provide evidence of causation rather it provides insights on correlations. Another challenge this paper faces is that the population data, used to estimate the school age and working age population, is not updated regularly, which may lead to overestimation of Venezuelan population in Roraima as it is the main gateway. However, further research is needed to study the impacts of the policy already in place, like the relocation programs. Research is also needed to study how language barrier and xenophobia are a↵ecting

> 31Fundamental level refers here to grades 6 to grade 9 and primary refers to grade 5 completed.

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