Morgen Makombo Sikwila
The outflow of most qualified and competent individuals from less developed countries especially in Africa to developed nations has become a source of worry in recent times among scholars as well as concerned individuals.
The trend has continued to deprive the continent of its human resources.
Brain drain also known as human capital flight is the movement of people especially the most skilled and competent individuals or manpower from the less developed countries to developed countries where they are believed the returns of their human capital is appreciated.
A number of factors have been identified as the reasons or causes of brain drain in the developing countries, especially in Africa and Zimbabwe is not spared. These reasons include conflicts and political instability, job opportunities, better standard of living, favourable environment and among others. These reasons can be further classified into push and pull factors. The push factors are the negative aspects that constitute to the outflow of skilled labour or professional from developing countries to developed nations which includes political turmoil, problem of unemployment, economic uncertainty, poverty, underdevelopment, lack of research facilities, job discrimination, absence of conducive working environments, lack of freedom and among others.
The pull factors are the positive features that have culminated to the movement of most qualified and competent individuals from less developed countries to developed nations such as superb economic outlook, the prestige of foreign training, a better quality of life, higher paying jobs, modernized educational system that gives room for quality training, conducive political atmosphere, intellectual freedom and so forth.
Other factors include institutional, lack of investment, pervasive corruption and poor infrastructures that can make life more meaningful.
Over the years, in most developing countries, virtually every sector of the economy has become moribund due to endemic corruption which has affected institutional policies and regulations. In fact, corruption is another form of abuse of public confidence for personal gain.
A corrupt free environment gives room for investment and efforts to increase the pie other than merely fighting over its distribution and thus promote growth. To this end, good governance and low level of corruption accelerate the process of development.
Inadequate infrastructure is the main hurdle to economic growth and development through its debilitating effect on investment inflow, competitiveness, cost of doing business, people’s confidence in government and general productivity.
Brain drain has serious effects on both the home and host countries. Developed countries more often than not selecting out the best Africa has to give in terms of socio-economic and educational background. In fact, developed nations benefit tremendously from the African brain drain.
Among the effects of brain drain includes dropping in the quality of service due to absence of skilled personnel in the home countries to the economic benefits made from remittances. One of the notable consequence of brain drain is the shortage of qualified manpower in the critical sectors like education, health, science, technology and business.
The absence of competent individuals has a direct and negative effect on the quality service delivery to the public in the home countries. In the educational sector that outflow of proficient academics and teachers has resulted in the fall in the quality of education. The problem has also discouraged the process of knowledge creation.
In the health care area, the scourge of brain drain has led to inadequate healthcare delivery services. The gap in ratio of medical doctors and other health professionals to patients is troubling. In Zimbabwe during the R.G. Mugabe era, much of academic staff left for Europe. A lot of money is spent in training professionals.
However, despite the negative effects of brain drain to the development of developed countries, there are still some positive aspects that can be accrued from this phenomenon. Remittances are one of the benefits of brain drain to the developing nations.
These monies are used by families to elevate quality of life and may assist in sending relatives and children to school, purchasing houses, repair existing structures or other familial expenses. A big chunk of Zimbabwe’s Gross Domestic Product is accrued from remittances from across the world.
Remittances are a vital source of foreign exchange earnings in Zimbabwe. Again, when people migrate from developing nations to developed nations, they acquire modern skills and expertise that they can also use to better the lives of their people at home once they return.
The low economic growth in Zimbabwe is linked to brain drain owing to several factors such as institutional failures, low investment and endemic level of corruption as well as lack of social amenities like health care system, quality education, roads and piped borehole water energy cum other facilities that can make life more meaningful.
Policymakers need to put in place sufficient incentives and mechanisms for migrants and their families to invest remittances in capital-accumulation projects that benefit the whole economy.
It is prudent that governments should create programs that can enable youths to realize their potential and increase the number of educational visas that allow young people to attend college abroad.
A sound macroeconomic policy should be put in place. The Government of Zimbabwe should eradicate corruption and nepotism at all levels of Government.
Morgen Makombo Sikwila
MSc Peace and Governance
BSc Counselling
Diploma in Environmental Health Health
Certificate in Marketing Management
email address morgensikwilam@gmail.com
Phone Number: 0772823282
