Economic crisis slows migration from Dominican to Puerto Rico

12/9/10, San Juan, "The economic crisis changes the trend of migration from the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico,

• the latter being used as a bridge to the United States

and the Dominican community living between 70,000 and 200,000. The deep economic recession that hit Puerto Rico for more than four years has reduced the arrival of Dominicans to the Commonwealth, according to Efe said the consul general of the Dominican Republic in San Juan, Maximo Taveras.

• "The Dominican Republic next year will grow about 7.4 percent, causing people see opportunities in the country," said Taveras.

The diplomat qualified that the increased surveillance of the waters that separate was another reason brake irregularly shaped Dominicans trying to reach Puerto Rico.

Concerning the controversial issue of the number of Dominicans living in Puerto Rico, said that knowing the exact number is impossible

• because a significant percentage are illegal,

but pointed to the 200,000 people, a number he called only speculative.

For his part, Professor of Anthropology at the University of Puerto Rico and demographics expert Jorge Duany said that despite the economic crisis that hit Puerto Rico

• Dominican flow has not stopped.

Duany recalled that the economic development gap between them and the factor of being the dollar the currency of Puerto Rico makes the

• wages of the Commonwealth remain well above the Dominican Republic.

The expert qualified that, in any case, there has been a reduction in the arrival of Dominicans to Puerto Rico when comparing the last ten years with the nineties.

Duany explained that Dominicans coming to Puerto Rico are employed in low-skilled jobs, especially domestic service and construction,

• a trend that he said is no different to that of immigrants elsewhere in the world.

The professor noted that Dominicans have traditionally used Puerto Rico as a bridge to the United States, where an estimated one million lives near people of that nationality.

However, he added that some groups of Dominicans have preferred to take Puerto Rico as a destination, due to the greater ease of adjustment found on the Caribbean island by language, culture and historical ties between the two countries.

• Duany said the issue of the number of Dominicans living in Puerto Rico is controversial, although the last estimate, taken from a sample, the Census points to

a figure close to 68,000 people in the statutory scheme.

He recalled that since 1966, where he began recording such data, have been lawfully admitted 134,000 Dominicans in Puerto Rico.

The Coast Guard stopped between 1982 and 2009 a total of

• 35,600 Dominicans trying to enter Puerto Rico irregularly.

Unofficial sources estimate that the Dominicans constitute 50 percent of foreign residents in the Commonwealth."

from El Nuevo Diario, 12/9/10, "Economic crisis changes migratory tendencies between Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico" google translation from Spanish. original Spanish.

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