Nepalese become fifth largest group of permit holders: Cayman News Service

(CNS): There were 385 work permit holders from the Himalayan Kingdom of Nepal in the Cayman Islands at the end of 2018, but that number has more than tripled in the past six years. The latest statistics released by WORC show that as of July 1, there were 1,245 Nepalese workers in the Cayman Islands, making them now the fifth largest group of overseas workers, second only to the British and ahead of Canadians.

According to the latest statistics, there are 37,309 work permit holders. This is down slightly from the record high of 37,437 in April, reflecting the seasonal slowdown in the hospitality industry, which is unlikely to see a downward trend.

While permit holders come from more than 130 different countries, the high number of people from Nepal suggests the demographics of migrant workers are changing. More than half of the 337 permits issued in the second quarter of 2024 were to Nepalese workers.

Although the government needs to understand the demographics of work permit holders in order to improve the much-criticized permit, residence and status system, little data is provided to the public on such trends and possible reasons for a sudden increase in the number of permit holders from a particular country.

According to the International Labour Organization (ILO), more than 1,600 Nepalese, mostly men, are leaving their homeland every day in search of work abroad, largely due to the country’s economic stagnation since the pandemic. Push factors are also rooted in the political and economic situation, as well as the impact of climate change and natural disasters, which have made livelihoods such as local farmers precarious. But the pull factors, especially for the Cayman Islands, are less obvious.

Most Nepalese migrants go to Malaysia or the Middle East. While the number going to the Cayman Islands is small by comparison, it may indicate a new pattern here: employers tend to offer jobs to friends and family of existing workers in their home country, rather than looking elsewhere or trying to find local workers.

Successive Cayman Islands governments have stated that their goal is to diversify the nationalities of the cardholders to address local concerns about the dominance of a single nationality. However, Jamaicans remain the largest group and have been so for decades, which is not surprising given the neighboring islands’ history and many direct connections with the Cayman Islands.

The immigration system is designed to make it more difficult for work permit holders from larger nationality groups to obtain permanent residency by reducing or eliminating the points awarded to work permit holders from those countries when they apply.

Jamaicans and Filipinos, the two largest groups (15,404 and 6,460 respectively), receive no extra points for their nationality. Indians are the third largest group, with 2,092 people, and Britons (just over 2,000) receive only five points, while applicants from other countries receive 10 points as they make up less than 5% of the total number of permits.

This means that Nepalese can still receive 10 points if they apply for permanent residency. However, as was the case with workers from India, if the number of Nepalese migrant workers continues to increase rapidly, the nationality bonus points will decrease.

The entire points system has been heavily criticized and has formed the basis of successful legal challenges by many PR applicants. In August 2022, local lawyer Steve McField was appointed to lead a team of experts to review the points system.

However, it is unclear when the results of the committee’s work will be released or whether the government is serious about addressing immigration issues, particularly the path to Caymanian citizenship. Labour Minister Dwayne Seymour told parliament this week that he wants to make it more difficult to obtain Caymanian citizenship.

WORC’s immigration board and administrative staff have recently sped up the processing of Rights of Caymanians (RTBC) applications, while new applications appear to be declining, according to data released by local law firm HSM through a FOI request and distributed to its clients.

The Cayman Islands Identity and Permanent Residence Board approved 71 naturalization-based status applications and 107 marriage-based status applications in May 2024. “During this period, only 38 naturalization-based RTBC applications and 39 marriage-based applications were submitted,” HSM’s lawyers said in the notice.

“This suggests that the Commission is currently completing far more applications than are currently being submitted and that applicants for Cayman citizenship may therefore find that the wait time for a determination will be significantly reduced from nearly two years in January 2024 to an average of approximately 15 months,” the lawyer added.