Immigration of skilled workers to São Paulo, Brazil, has increased in recent years

Number of foreign professionals with at least one university degree who add value to the economy via knowledge and creativity has grown by over 40% in the last ten years, survey shows.

By Elton Alisson, in Montevideo  |  Agência FAPESP – Immigration to São Paulo State, in Brazil, by engineers, scientists and other knowledge workers has increased more than 40% in the last ten years. Knowledge workers are typically defined as qualified professionals with at least one university degree who add value to the economy thanks to their intellectual training and creativity.

In 2006 São Paulo State had 6,075 foreign knowledge workers in formal employment. By 2010 the number had risen to 7,448 and in 2015 it reached 8,615.

This information, obtained from the Labor Ministry’s Annual Employee Register (RAIS), was presented by Rosana Baeninger during FAPESP Week Montevideo. Baeninger is a researcher affiliated with the University of Campinas’s Center for Population Studies (NEPO-UNICAMP) and principal investigator for the Thematic Project “São Paulo Migration Observatory”, supported by FAPESP.

The symposium was organized by the Montevideo Group Association of Universities (AUGM), Uruguay’s University of the Republic (UDELAR) and FAPESP, and took place on November 17-18 at UDELAR’s campus in Montevideo. Its purpose was to strengthen existing collaborations and establish new partnerships among South American scientists in a range of knowledge areas. Researchers and leaders of institutions in Uruguay, Brazil, Argentina, Chile and Paraguay attended the meeting.

“Brazil, and especially São Paulo State, have benefited from this immigration by skilled workers and their participation in the national labor market,” Baeninger told Agência FAPESP.

The numbers of knowledge professionals coming to São Paulo State from other countries have risen largely owing to Brazil’s insertion into the economic globalization process characterized by the intensification of capital flows and the mobility of industrial production, she said.

International capital flows and industrial mobility have fueled growth in demand for skilled manpower in several countries, especially in sectors such as science and technology.

“Immigration by knowledge professionals to countries like Brazil is a phenomenon that has always existed. In the 1970s it was called the ‘brain drain’. Now, however, it has intensified because of this new configuration of the globalized market in which corporations require more skilled workers, stimulating a new flow or circulation of brain power,” Baeninger said.

Immigration of knowledge professionals to São Paulo State has risen most from South America, especially other Mercosur countries, according to the survey.

In 2015 this category of workers from other South American countries such as Argentina, Bolivia, Chile and Uruguay accounted for 45% of the foreign skilled workforce in São Paulo State, up from 33.23% in 2006.

One of the reasons for this growth, according to Baeninger, was a Mercosur agreement that facilitated the granting of temporary work visas to citizens of other member countries.

“Knowledge professionals have always come from Argentina and Chile to Brazil,” she said. “The flow increased in the 1970s and 1980s, when those two countries were ruled by violently repressive military dictatorships. In recent years, however, the number of immigrants from these and other nearby countries to São Paulo State has risen owing to factors such as the creation of Mercosur.”

Most of the knowledge professionals who have come to São Paulo State from other Mercosur countries are men, although the number of women has increased in recent years.

About 88% of these professionals are labeled “super-creative” and have university degrees; 4% have a master’s degree and 8% have a PhD.

According to the survey, most foreign skilled workers are in the interior of the state or near the capital, in cities such as Campinas, whereas knowledge professionals who migrate from other regions of Brazil end up mostly in metropolitan São Paulo, the magnet for in-migrants.

“There’s a strong presence of foreign knowledge workers in parts of São Paulo State located farther inland, where multinationals have installed quite a lot of factories,” Baeninger said.

“São Paulo needs to take more advantage of the benefits offered by this increase in the numbers of highly qualified immigrants.”

Benefits

The benefits include knowledge exchange and technology transfer, according to Baeninger.

Another is the demand from these professionals for new services hitherto available only in the metropolitan area, such as primary and secondary schools with English-language teaching, as well as language schools.

“Urbanization is becoming more dynamic in smaller towns,” she said. “More malls and business centers are being built to keep up with the demand from highly qualified professionals.”

Another contribution is demystification of the perception that immigration ‘imports poverty’ to Brazil.

“As the populations of cities and towns in São Paulo State come into contact with this contingent of knowledge professionals from other countries they discover that there’s also an inflow of qualified immigrants into Brazil,” Baeninger said.

The flow of knowledge professionals from other countries of the region is indeed accompanied by a movement of unskilled immigrants from the same countries, she added.

For example, Bolivia exports not only highly qualified professionals to Brazil, including physicians, but also workers with relatively little schooling who mostly work for the garment industry in sweatshops.

“The coexistence of these distinct groups of immigrants in a society is important to deconstruct prejudice about Bolivians and other foreign migrants,” Baeninger said.

Despite the recession

The flow of foreign knowledge professionals will not be stemmed by Brazil’s economic recession, she predicts, especially in the case of immigrants from Latin America.

In 2010, for example, the researchers found that the number of qualified immigrants from Latin America to Brazil increased compared with previous years despite the setbacks suffered by the economy following the outbreak of the global financial crisis in 2008.

“In 2010 the numbers of qualified immigrants from Latin American countries continued to grow despite the 2008 crisis, while other nationalities decreased,” she said.

“My hypothesis is that the flow of foreign knowledge workers to Brazil won’t stop rising especially from other Mercosur countries.”