El Salvador

The Law for the Protection and Development of the Salvadoran Migrant Persons and their Families (Ley Especial para la Protección y Desarrollo de la Persona Migrante Salvadoreña y su Familia) was passed by the Parliamentary Assembly in 2011.

The plan is focused on different priorities such as promoting an inclusive economic model and advancing universal social services and social protection. It also places human rights at the centre of policy making, including human rights of migrants and their families. It contains different points of action, and one of them is to support migrants abroad and link them to political, social and economic events in El Salvador.

“Distance Education Oriented for Salvadorans Abroad” is the name of the program currently being executed by the Viceministry for Salvadorans Abroad and Universidad Tecnológica de El Salvador (UTEC), which will allow the undertaking of joint actions to develop distance educational services for Salvadorans living overseas.

The plan promotes the coordination and inter-linkage of actions over a 5 year horizon (2016-2020) and seeks to give people incentives to stay in their own countries by means of structural change that offers economic opportunities and transforms the citizen’s of the Northern Triangle of Central America quality of life, mainly in regions affected by the highest rates of poverty, migration and vulnerability.

On August 29, 2011, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of El Salvador and the Occupational Health and Security Administration of the US Department of Labor signed a memorandum of understanding in Washington, D.C., which recognized the joint commitment of both nations in the labor rights protection of Salvadoran immigrant workers.

The Migration Information and Statistics System for Mesoamerica (SIEMMES by its Spanish acronym) is a system of migration information designed to capture and monitor the magnitude and characteristics of migratory movements from, to and between the Central American countries and Mexico, by coordinating and compatibilizing the data generated by different agencies in all those countries. 

Set up in 2001, it includes Belize, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua and Panama.

The Salvadoreños en el Exterior (Salvadorans Abroad) portal is a platform that proposes a set of social projects and basic infrastructures in the most vulnerable areas of El Salvador, which need financial resources, to Salvadorans residing abroad. It creates opportunities for these citizens to contribute to the development of their country and to use their financial resources to successful productive initiatives.

The Vice-Ministry for Salvadorans abroad has the main goal of promoting the protection of the Salvadorans residing abroad and to enable their access to opportunities to be part of the development of the country.

The El Salvador Global “knowledge network” aims to contribute to the scientific, academic, technological, and business development of El Salvador by engaging highly qualified Salvadorans abroad. It taps into the knowledge, connections, and resources of Salvadorans abroad to promote short-term exchanges (such as lectures, conferences, seminars, internships, and mentoring), to foster business development and entrepreneurship in El Salvador, and to promote scientific and academic innovation in the country (for instance through university - enterprise transfers). 

This program intends to create concrete links between the country and the diaspora. The community which is organized outside the country is involved in a program of reading, writing, through volunteers who come from outside the country. They come to El Salvador to teach the communities in which they usually live to read and write. ne of the primary goals of the Literacy Program is to reduce the level of illiteracy from a rate of 18% in 2009 to 4% by 2014. This would put El Salvador on par with Costa Rica as having one the highest literacy rates in Central America.