IOM, UNHCR commend Ecuador’s efforts to regularize Venezuelan refugees and migrants

GENEVA – The International Organization for Migration (IOM) and UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, today praised Ecuador’s new presidential decree introducing an extraordinary regularization process for Venezuelans and their families who currently lack regular status in the country. This initiative is expected to benefit some 100,000 people, according to Government estimates. 

Ecuador hosts the fifth largest number of Venezuelan refugees and migrants in the Americas. The regularization will assist thousands who registered for a previous process in 2022 but were unable to complete the necessary steps to finally obtain their visas. They could not obtain regular status because of practical barriers to meeting the requirements, including providing necessary documentation such as passports or valid national IDs, and covering the costs of additional paperwork.

The process will allow Venezuelans who are in Ecuador irregularly to access a type of visa called Temporary Residence of Exception, which initially lasts two years and can be renewed for another two years. Beneficiaries will join the approximately 97,000 people already regularized.  

“This initiative will help thousands of people emerge from the shadows of irregularity, overcome the significant barriers posed by years of lack of documentation, and finally contribute to their host communities,” said Eduardo Stein, Joint Special Representative of IOM and UNHCR for Refugees and Migrants from Venezuela. “Evidence shows that integrating migrants and refugees has important benefits for the development of entire communities.” 

Refugees and migrants are among those most vulnerable to violence, exploitation, human trafficking, and overall exclusion, particularly those without regular status and documentation. This new process in Ecuador aims to eliminate some of the barriers faced during the previous regularization process, including allowing Venezuelans to apply using national identity documents and passports that have expired for up to five years.  

“In these challenging times worldwide and locally, facilitating these avenues for protection and integration truly reflects the spirit of solidarity put forward in the Global Refugee Forum, the Global Compact for Safe, Orderly, and Regular Migration, the Global Compact on Refugees and the Los Angeles Declaration on Migration and Protection,” added Stein.

A joint study released earlier in 2024 by the World Bank (WB), the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), and UNHCR revealed how migrants and refugees are key to filling gaps in local labour markets and contribute to economic growth in host countries. Additionally, an IOM study demonstrates that regular migration can have a positive impact on a country’s tax revenue (document in Spanish), as is the case in Colombia, where Venezuelan refugees and migrants represented nearly 2 per cent of the total tax revenue in 2022. In Ecuador, where over half of the Venezuelan population are aged 18 to 59, there are significant opportunities to boost investment and economic growth. This is attainable when people have a regular status. 

This is the third time since 2019 that Ecuador has allowed an extraordinary regularization process for Venezuelan migrants and refugees. They join other countries in the region, such as Colombia, Peru and Brazil, which have continued to provide alternative avenues to foster regularization and address the needs of millions across the Americas. 

UNHCR and IOM, as co-leaders of the Regional Inter-agency Coordination Platform for Refugees and Migrants from Venezuela (R4V), reiterate their support to Ecuador and call on the international community, development actors, the private sector and international and regional financial institutions to provide sufficient and timely support to the ongoing commitment from governments in the region to foster protection and long-term solutions for Venezuelan refugees and migrants and host communities. 

For more information please contact:

In Ecuador

• Paula Vásquez, IOM, [email protected], +593 99 923 1572 
• Diana Díaz Rodríguez, UNHCR, [email protected], +593 99 401 3567 

In Panama (regional)

• Gema Cortes, IOM, [email protected], +507 62694574  
• Luiz Fernando Godinho, UNHCR, [email protected], +507 6356 0074  

In Geneva 

• Daniela Rovina, IOM, [email protected], +41-22 717 92 98,
• William Spindler, UNHCR, [email protected], +41 79 549 5998