Determinants of Economic Condition of Rural-Urban Migrants at Place of Destination: The case of Nekemte City, Western Ethiopia

Abstract

The over whole purpose of the study was to investigate determinants of economic condition of rural-urban migrants in Nekemte city, Western Ethiopia. Specifically, the objectives delved on assessing post migration economic condition of migrants and determining factors of migrant attributes playing significant role. A longitudinal research design with qualitative and quantitative approaches of data collection and analysis were employed. Accordingly, relevant data was collected from randomly selected 184 individuals identified by the municipality as migrants through survey and key informant interview. The study uncovered that the variation of annual income, amount of saving, access to education and job satisfaction of migrants before and after migration was statistically significant at (p<0.001) indicating a general improvement in economic condition in post migration. Moreover, as per regression analysis, gender of migrant, level of education, job type, years of stay and access to loans were found to significantly determine income change in post migration. Conclusively, though many remains to be studied, it’s evident from the finding that rural out migration could potentially improve the wellbeing of the migrants and thus, the national and regional governments need to devise policies and strategies that fosters rural-urban linkage for promoting greater economic opportunities.