YEREVAN. – A total of 1,780,160 people have arrived in, and 1,888,165 have departed from, Armenia from January to September 2013.

“People in Need” NGO Migration Project Manager Tatevik Bejanyan stated the aforesaid at a press conference on Wednesday.

Bejanyan noted that December 18 is International Migrants Day. She added, however, that there is no registration of migrants in Armenia, and therefore they ascertain the numbers through departures and arrivals.    

Presenting the respective statistics, Bejanyan stated that 73 percent of the people that departed from Armenia have headed to Russia. The rest primarily traveled to the US, Ukraine, and several other countries. The least number of people went to the Netherlands, Belarus, Turkey, Belgium, and Georgia.     

In addition, 77 percent of the Armenian migrants are men, and the largest age group that departed from Armenia is between the ages of 26 and 35 (30%).

The NGO official also informed that the majority of Armenia’s migrant workers have received secondary education.

Tatevik Bejanyan added that the bank remittances to Armenia comprise 20 percent of the country’s GDP. Furthermore, 80 percent of the Armenian households that receive remittances from abroad are reluctant to open savings accounts in banks.