According to the report, around 60,000 Portuguese emigrated in 2022, the same as the previous year, with the UK losing importance due to Brexit and Switzerland again becoming the main destination country.
According to the 2022 emigration report prepared by the Emigration Observatory and Rede Migra, just over 60 thousand Portuguese will emigrate in 2022, the same as the previous year, but stagnation is evident as “virtually all outflows have increased, except by destination which was the United Kingdom.”
In the United Kingdom, once the main destination for Portuguese emigrants, emigration has fallen by more than 40%, behind only Switzerland, Spain and France.
In Portugal, according to UN data cited in the document, there are “just over 2.1 million Portuguese emigrants, that is, people born in Portugal living abroad.”
This places it 26th in the ranking of countries with the largest number of emigrants, topped by India (17.5 million). In 2022, the main destination country for Portuguese emigration was Switzerland, with approximately 10,000 Portuguese arrivals, followed by Spain (8,272) and the UK (7,941).
France registered 7,663 applications, Germany – 5,935. Of the 3,000 records, the report’s authors mention the Netherlands (4,533), Luxembourg (3,633) and Belgium (3,529, in 2021). 1,812 Portuguese emigrated to Denmark and 1,439 to Mozambique (in 2016, the latest year for which data is available).
In Luxembourg, Portuguese made up about 12% of total immigrant arrivals, in Macau the percentage was 3.6%, and in Switzerland 5.9%.
The report found that among immigrants in 2022, Portuguese were the nationality with the highest representation in Luxembourg, third in Macau and fourth in Switzerland. The Portuguese were the fifteenth most represented nationality among new immigrants, although they accounted for only 2.2% of total foreign arrivals.
It should be noted that there was an increase in the number of entries to Norway (36.1%), Sweden (34.1%), the Netherlands (33.1%) and Switzerland (29.6%). With lower values, but with an increase of approximately 20%, follow Brazil (21.9%) and Austria (19.1%). More Portuguese men emigrate than women, and most of them are young, able-bodied people.
France remains the country in the world with the largest number of permanent immigrants born in Portugal (573 thousand), followed by Switzerland (204 thousand), USA (184 thousand), UK (156 thousand), Brazil (138 thousand). ), Canada (134 thousand) and Germany (115 thousand). Despite using 2021 data, the report presents the United Kingdom as the country where the majority of Portuguese emigrants acquired citizenship in their destination country (2,561 processes), a phenomenon that the authors attribute mainly to fears caused by Brexit and the reduction of associated rights. to foreign status that may arise.
This is followed by Switzerland (2087 in 2021), USA (1555), Luxembourg (1141) and France (1128 in 2020).
In 2021, Portuguese made up 17% of foreigners granted Luxembourg citizenship, a high percentage that has increased for the second time in the last five years.
Of the foreigners granted Swiss citizenship, 5.6% were Portuguese, the lowest percentage recorded in the last seven years.
The 2022 Emigration Report was prepared by the Emigration Observatory and Rede Migra, within the Center for Research and Sociological Studies (CIES-IUL) of the Institute of the University of Lisbon (ISCTE-IUL).