Social and geographical characteristics of return migration of old people to Spain

Raúl Lardiés, Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas (CSIC)
Vicente Rodriguez, Instituto de Economía y Geografía, Spain

INTRODUCTION: The transformations in the Spanish migratory system in the last years have lead to Spain from being a country of emigration to become a country of immigration; the other outstanding fact is the increased importance of the number of returnees, coming firstly from other countries, but also later, from other parts of the country. Return migration appeared in the 70s, when many old emigrants returned encouraged by the world-wide economy and the Spanish transformations. Recently, important changes in return flows have been taken place, after a constant economic and social development in Spain. Return migration has been a type of mobility scarcely researched in Spain. Some studies have analyzed the return flows, but mainly from inside the country. Nevertheless, research and compared analyses of the regional and demographic dimension of the phenomenon do not exist. OBJECTIVES: The aim of this poster is to analyze the return migration of elderly from foreigner countries to Spain between1988 and 2004. Firstly, the demographic structure and some characteristics of the returned like sex, age and civil state. Secondly, the evolution and intensity of these flows, according to the origin and destination places; special attention will be lent to geographical aspects like the regional and provincial distribution, and the impact of returnees among the local population. The information will be displayed with the use of diverse graphical and cartographical material. DATA AND METHODS: The data that will be used for the presentation of the poster comes from the computered archives of the Estadistica de Variaciones Residenciales (Statistic of Residential Variations), for period 1988-2004. This source contains the annual residential discharges and losses and is offered by the National Institute of Estadistica (INE).