Most Bangladeshi migrants now live in the Gulf, not India
Where Bangladesh-born migrants live: six Gulf states, India and elsewhere, share of all 8.7 million (62 destinations), 1990–2024. UN estimates.
- 1. Egypt is set to outgrow Japan in 2027, then Russia
- 2. In 2025, Suez Canal traffic was under half its record
- 3. Egypt exports more fresh oranges than any other country
- 4. Egypt is the world's biggest wheat buyer
- 5. Saudi Arabia has more desalination capacity than the entire US
- 6. Three in four UAE residents are international migrants
- 7. Only America draws more new foreign projects than the UAE
- 8. Algeria outspends all of sub-Saharan Africa on its military
- 9. Women in MENA now outpace men at university
- 10. Dubai's airport handles more international travellers than Heathrow
- 11. The UAE sold more goods abroad than France in 2025
- 12. Oil now makes less than a third of Saudi power
- 13. Egypt now owes Russia more than any other government
- 14. Two-thirds of young Jordanian women in the workforce are jobless
- 15. Baghdad's mobile internet overtook Erbil's
- 16. Morocco climbed to second in world fertiliser exports
- 17. Algiers now has North Africa's fastest home internet
- 18. Saudi imports from China now top the Group of Seven
- 19. Syria has lost more stored water than drought-famous Iran
- 20. Chicken gives Egyptians twice the calories beef does
- 21. More young Tunisian men than women neither work nor study
- 22. Egypt tripled its ATMs per adult in ten years
- 23. Saudi Arabia's battery imports grew 46-fold since 2019
- 24. Viet Nam overtook China as Morocco's top smartphone supplier
- 25. Iraq went from one city of a million to eight
- 26. Saudi Arabia now receives more tourists than it sends abroad
- 27. Saudi Arabia now raises two-thirds of the chicken it eats
- 28. Most Bangladeshi migrants now live in the Gulf, not India
- 29. Japan's share of Qatar's exports fell from 30% to 7%
- 30. In purchasing power, Egypt overtook Nigeria as Africa's biggest economy
- 31. The Gulf now hosts a tenth of the world's migrants
Share of Bangladesh-born migrants living in the six Gulf states in 2024: 4.9 million of 8.7 million, up from 15% in 1990.
Share living in India, down from 80% in 1990: 4.06 million then, 2.29 million now.
Bangladesh-born migrants in Saudi Arabia alone in 2024, more than in India; it hosted 0.24 million in 1990.
the numbers & method
| Six Gulf states (%) | India (%) | Other (%) | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1990 | 14.6 | 80.0 | 5.4 |
| 2000 | 19.6 | 70.9 | 9.5 |
| 2010 | 39.2 | 45.0 | 15.8 |
| 2024 | 56.4 | 26.3 | 17.3 |
Claim types Estimate
UN DESA Population Division, International Migrant Stock 2024 (POP/DB/MIG/Stock/Rev.2024), table of migrant stock at mid-year by destination and origin, 1990–2024, read from UN DESA via the progrss vault (§4.11, un-migrant-stock passes value_checks). Estimate: stocks are people living outside their country of birth, from censuses, registers and surveys, with gaps filled by UN modelling; a 2024 value is a mid-2024 estimate. Set: the 62 destinations that have a Bangladesh-born stock in every year shown (1990, 2000, 2010, 2024); total 5.08 million in 1990 and 8.71 million in 2024. Gulf = Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Oman, Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain. India's stock includes people who moved before and around 1971 and has been shrinking as they age: the plate shows where the stock lives, not yearly departures. Malaysia's 2024 value (0.28 million) equals its 2015 and 2020 values in the file (carried forward by the UN).28 million) equals its 2020 value in the file (carried forward, part of 'Other'). Shares are progrss calculations; 2000 and 2010 shown for the path. Claim type: Estimate. The 62 destinations are every destination in the UN file for origin Bangladesh and sum exactly to the UN's own origin total (5.08 million in 1990, 8.71 million in 2024).
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