The African brain drain: scope and determinants

This paper empirically examines the determinants of highly-skilled emigration from Africa with recent original data set on international migration. The analysis shows that 10 out of the 53 African countries have lost more than 35 per cent of the their tertiary educated labor force and countries such as Cape Verde (68 percent), Gambia (63 percent), Seychelles (56 percent), Maurice (56 percent) and Sierra Leone (53 percent) suffered from a massive brain drain. Regression models reveal that economic and noneconomic considerations have a strong impact on the African brain drain. This study finds that the degree of fractionalization (ethnic, linguistic and religious) at origin countries, jobs opportunities at destination countries, selective immigration policies, wage gap, geographical distance, former colonial links, and linguistic proximity between countries of origin and destination are the main forces driving highly-skilled emigration from Africa.