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The provision of reintegration assistance to migrants in their countries of origin is an essential element to ensure sustainability of returns. IOM and partners in countries of origin provide migrants with socio-economic support to promote their self-sufficiency and contributions to their local communities. The sustainability of returns may, however, ultimately only be ensured in tandem with socio-economic development. IOM strives to support sustainable reintegration of migrants returning to a variety of contexts, recognizing, that the factors affecting the reintegration process and subsequently its sustainability are not dissimilar from those that resulted in the decision to migrate in the first place. IOM therefore asserts that reintegration can be considered sustainable when returnees have reached levels of economic self-sufficiency, social stability within their communities, and psychosocial well-being that allow them to cope with (re)migration drivers. Having achieved sustainable reintegration, returnees are able to make further migration decisions a matter of choice, rather than necessity. To achieve this objective, it is necessary to approach migrant reintegration in a comprehensive manner, considering the factors that can affect reintegration and addressing them in a way to respond to the needs of the individual returnees as well as the communities to which they return in a mutually beneficial way, and address the structural factors at play. Assistance to migrants, communities of return, and structural environments in countries of origin is therefore an essential element to ensuring sustainability of reintegration.
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