How does someone return home after years of living (or working) abroad, often with little money and their acquired skills not formally recognised, to a community that may see their return as failure? The recently published Knowledge Paper “Reintegration realities: post-return challenges and experience across countries”poses this question.
The Knowledge Paper is the first in a new series of Budapest Process knowledge products entitled “Reintegration is complicated: frameworks and outcomes in the Silk Routes Region.” It is an outcome of the discussions of the Thematic Working Group’s meeting on Return and Reintegration, which is co-chaired by Bangladesh, Iraq and Türkiye; as well as subsequent exchanges within the Budapest Process. These discussions highlighted the need to draw more systematically on evidence and research to better understand what shapes reintegration processes and outcomes.
The Knowledge Paper was presented in May at a webinar that focused on three of the Silk Routes countries covered by the study - Bangladesh, Iraq and Pakistan. Through a review of project documents, assessments, policy papers, and interviews with returnees, the Knowledge Paper unpacks the complexities and everyday barriers that [returnees] face in their home communities upon return. These include how the labour market works, pathways they have access to (or not) at institutional level, and the cross-cutting personal and social pressures they face.
Why challenges persist for returnees’ reintegration process
The Knowledge Product deepens the understanding of the multi-faceted challenges and identifies strategies to achieve more positive outcomes for returnees and the systems supporting their reintegration.
For most returnees, the process of return carries a burden not only to reconnect with their roots and routines, but also to settle old issues such as debts, changes in their community, or facing new institutional systems in place. They face challenges in their professional endeavours: often with sizeable experience abroad, they may return to high unemployment levels, having to compete with already entrenched competitors, or the perception that nepotism prevails in the job market.
Women face stigma, especially those returning from domestic work abroad; along with specific social pressures based on gender. There is also often a mismatch between returnees’ newly acquired skills and being unable to accredit or transfer these [skills] into the current labour market. Access to capital and the bureaucracies in the broader financial structure, can also hinder one’s entrepreneurial spirit – presenting another limitation to their options.
At a broader, institutional level, insights from the research show that returnees also struggle with assistance systems where information, eligibility, and follow-up are fragmented, transactional, and incoherent. The amount of required paperwork, frequent delays, and lack of follow-up also add to their difficult experience; along with low awareness of government’s programmes. As a result, as respondents have indicated, they often turn to informal sources in their own networks for advice or referral on where to find aid, trainings, or loans. While this may address their needs to an extent, in the long-term it creates inequality, depending on one’s proximity, influence, and access to networks.
Returnees also face psychosocial stressors in the process of reintegrating; delving in their personal dignity, sense of belonging, prospects for stability, and rebuilding social ties. From experiences examined across Bangladesh, Iraq and Pakistan, reintegration can become a ‘negotiation’ between family and community acceptance, social stigma, emotional struggles, and the financial strain of return.
Finally, service delivery to alleviate these challenges is often fragmented – making the return and reintegration process more of a patchwork of ‘options’ rather than a broad, streamlined system.
Solutions and recommendations to navigate the challenges
Reintegration transcends returnees’ struggles; it is rather systemic. By looking at the experiences of returnees in Bangladesh, Iraq, and Pakistan, the Knowledge Paper presents how they navigate a process spanning from work-related issues or logistics, to deeper, broader social issues. All three countries have reported significant progress in formalising reintegration in their national policy and institutional structures, moving beyond ad hoc or one-off solutions into more system-based approaches. In Iraq, for example, the government has strengthened the referral systems that now include immediate psychosocial referral as soon as a returnee registers; or expanding the work of airport reception centres as first-point for returnees upon arrival.
At a Budapest Process workshop in November 2025 in Istanbul, Türkiye, national officials and experts from some Budapest Process countries – including Bangladesh, Pakistan and Iraq – held dialogues and shared reflections on return and reintegration in the Silk Routes region and beyond. These exchanges formed part of the wider Budapest Process discussions that informed the development of the Knowledge paper. The meeting, in particular, stressed the need for services to be streamlined and embedded into national budget and protection systems; along with coordination frameworks within and between their ministries. While individual-level support is available (eg, skills training, counselling, etc), such a system can certainly benefit from a stronger referral framework to solidify a system that is more inclusive and sustainable towards wider coverage.
Therefore, the Knowledge Paper recommends that a stronger case management and referral system is most effective when integrated deeply in returnees’ journey, starting before their actual return; and linked with reintegration services and social structures in-country. It also cites investment as vital to community-based initiatives, particularly in the social aspects of returnees’ reintegration, that strengthens the acceptance and support towards vulnerable groups.
Institutional alignment of services, such as harmonised data-sharing between agencies and better digitalisation would improve registration, monitoring, and referral across ministries and service providers. And while countries benefit from international support and the strong initiatives of civil society, reintegration programmes should also be better aligned with national development goals and budgetary frameworks to ensure its sustainability and scalability.
Reintegration is both an individual and collective process. If returnees’ economic, and psychosocial needs are addressed institutionally, and when their communities see them as an asset, their return and successful reintegration would not only be a personal achievement for them, but can be an even greater opportunity for society at large.
About the Knowledge Paper
The Knowledge Paper “Reintegration realities: post-return challenges and experience across countries” was developed under auspices of the Budapest Process (of which ICMPD is the Secretariat), chaired by Türkiye and co-chaired by Hungary. Its findings contribute to ongoing work of the Thematic Working Group and offers insights into the real, lived experiences of returnees, including on integrating [back] into the labour market, as well as their interface with institutions, and the referral mechanisms available to them.
The Budapest Process is funded through grants and individual contributions by Budapest Process countries and co-funded by the EU through the Migration Partnership Facility. This Knowledge Product was funded by Sweden.