A high-level Barbadian delegation, headed by Minister of Home Affairs and Information Gregory Nicholls, is set to travel to the United States to take part in the second iteration of the International Migration Review Forum, a major UN-backed global gathering running from May 5 to 8. The forum stands as the leading intergovernmental global space where United Nations member states can convene to exchange updates and perspectives on the progress they have made in advancing the full implementation of the Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration (GCM), as well as the migration-related targets embedded within the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.
Over the course of the four-day event, participants will engage in a structured lineup of activities designed to drive collaborative dialogue. These include four interactive round table sessions that bring together stakeholders from multiple sectors, a formal policy debate, and a closing plenary session. Core discussion topics will center on the GCM’s 23 interconnected objectives, ongoing barriers and challenges that nations face in putting these objectives into practice, cross-border capacity-building frameworks, and both long-standing and newly emerging issues shaping global migration patterns in the 21st century.
Beyond on-the-ground dialogue, the forum will also deliberate on potential guidance to strengthen the entire UN system’s efforts to boost cross-agency effectiveness, improve policy coherence, and better support national governments as they work to meet their GCM commitments.
As the official representative of Barbados, Minister Nicholls is scheduled to deliver a three-minute national statement to the forum’s General Assembly segment during the policy debate, outlining the Caribbean island nation’s approach to domestic and international migration policy. Ahead of the official opening of the forum, an additional pre-event informal interactive hearing will be held on May 4, gathering input from a wide range of non-state stakeholders across civil society, the private sector, and academia. A civil society representative will present a full summary of the hearing’s key takeaways during the plenary’s opening session to ensure grassroots and multi-stakeholder perspectives are integrated into official forum discussions. The report was sourced via the Barbados Government Information Service (BGIS) and SFC.