Rural-urban out-migration in Nepal: characteristics, determinants and implications for development

Abstract:

Rural-urban migration and the receipt of remittances has been an integral part of the process of socio-economic development in countries for two centuries. In recent decades, developing countries have come to depend increasingly on international migration and remittances for development. Nepal is one of the world’s poorest countries, and most dependent on this latter process. In 2023 UNC and collaborators in Nepal collected detailed data from stratified probability samples of rural households in each of two rural districts (differing in hydrology and location relative to main urban areas) in the middle hills region–Salyan and Pyuthan. Complete data were collected on 872 households (55% with one or more long-term migrants) on not only the characteristics of out-migrants at the time of leaving but also of the characteristics of the households, including agricultural and forest land and use, off-farm employment, raising animals, sources of water, crop raiding and plot abandonment, changes over time in most of these, involvement in CFUGs (below), topography and elevation, etc., and migrants and remittances. In addition, data were collected from Community Forest User Groups (CFUGs), providing data for taking into account contextual factors including location and access, infrastructure, and social involvement. We propose to first carry out a complete descriptive analysis of apparent links between individual and household attributes and migration with (74%) and without receipt of remittances. Migrants are overwhelmingly male, and move to international (India, Gulf States, mostly) and urban destinations. We will examine in depth effects of attributes of migrants, households, communities.

Author: Qi Zhang Updated: November 10, 2025