Migration from Latin America to Europe


Latin American migration to Europe is the diaspora of Latin Americans to the continent of Europe, dating back to the first decades of the Spanish and Portuguese empires in the Americas. Latin Americans in Europe are now a rapidly growing group consisting of immigrants from Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Puerto Rico, Uruguay and Venezuela. A large majority of these are residents in Spain or have been naturalized as Spanish citizens, and in the case of Brazilians, residents of Portugal or naturalized Portuguese citizens. The main reasons of their migration to Spain and Portugal are the common language, family ties and cultural proximity to Spain and Portugal. Italy also has a sizable Latin American community, many of whom are descendants of the Italian diaspora in Latin America.

Spain

Spain is the second destination of choice after the United States for Latin American migrants and the vast majority of Latin Americans in Europe are residents or nationals of this country.
After several years of decline since a peak in 2010, the population of Spain born in Latin American has grown again since 2016. In 2019, 3,114,076 Spanish people born in South, Central America or the Caribbean had been legally residing in Spain for the last 12 months, compared to 2,340,247 in 2016 and 2,459,098 in 2010. A majority hold Spanish citizenship.
Following the "Law of historic memory" Latin Americans with a Spanish parent or grandparent have automatic right to Spanish citizenship, even without residing in the country. This potentially applies to millions of Latin Americans. In addition, all Latin Americans from Spanish speaking countries qualify for Spanish citizens after two years' residence, regardless of recent ancestry. This compares very favorably to the requirement of ten years' residence for immigrants from other countries.
As a result a significant and ever growing portion of Latin American immigrants have acquired Spanish citizenship due to naturalization laws and the falling number of Latin Americans residing in Spain is primarily due to them acquiring Spanish nationality and no longer being classed as immigrants. In the period between 2011 and 2013, over one million immigrants acquired Spanish citizenship and over 75% of these were Latin American. As an example, by 2014 the majority of Spain's 408,944 Ecuatorian-born residents had already acquired Spanish citizenship and were no longer included national statistics tracking immigration. As a result, Latin Americans with Spanish citizenship living in other European countries such as the UK, France or Germany benefiting from European freedom of movement and establishment for all EU citizens will be categorized as Spaniards when using nationality as a criterion to determine the country of origin of a particular EU country's immigrant population. Despite Spain's prolonged 2008-2015 economic crisis during which the country suffered years of massive unemployment and went from having the second highest immigration rate in the world to becoming a net-emigrant country, less than 30% of Spain's Latin American immigrants have left the country during this period. As a result of the combined effect of nationalization and net emigration during the economic crisis, the Latin American resident population yet to acquire Spanish nationality fell steadily to around 900,000 in 2015.
Country of birthPopulation Corresponding article
408,083Ecuadorians in Spain
440,197Colombians in Spain
267,994Argentines in Spain
323,575Venezuelans in Spain
218,129Peruvians in Spain
173,531Dominicans in Spain
174,672
151,327
143,228
97,528Paraguayans in Spain
105,943
75,770Uruguayans in Spain

Germany

Country of birthPopulation Corresponding article
38,650Brazilians in Germany
14,204Mexicans in Germany
13,992
9,179
8,493
6,976
6,426
4,993
4,791
4,527
1,818
1,320

France

The most numerous are the Brazilians, followed by Colombians and Venezuelans, Peruvians Argentinians and Chileans.

United Kingdom

According to the 2001 UK Census, 62,735 Latin Americans in the United Kingdom were born in their respective nations of origin. There were also a further 1,338 people who stated their birthplace as 'South or Central America'. In 2009, the Office for National Statistics estimated that the number of Brazilian-born people in the UK alone had risen to around 60,000 and the number of Colombian-born to around 22,000. Estimates for other Latin American countries were not made because the sample size did not allow for estimation of the size of smaller groups with sufficient degree of accuracy.
Country of birthPopulation Corresponding article
52,148Brazilians in the United Kingdom
25,761Colombians in the United Kingdom
10,550
9,771Mexicans in the United Kingdom
9,150
8,767Ecuadorians in the United Kingdom
7,246Peruvians in the United Kingdom
7,130Chileans in the United Kingdom
3,765Bolivians in the United Kingdom
2,481
1,377
1,364

Norway

From 1977 to 2012, the number of non-Norwegian citizens living in Norway of European descent has increased from around 46,000 to around 280,000. In the same period the number of citizens of nations on other continents increased from about 25,000 to about 127,000, of which 112,230 belong to Asia, Africa and South America.
Immigrants and Norwegian-born to immigrant parents, by country of origin
RankCountry of originPopulation Population
1.6,4917,904
2.8244,017
3.6043,841
4.4921,295
5.286959
6.378890
7.276844
8.174492
9.134308
11.134235
12.167234
13.81191
15.78159
16.52133
17.64117

The Netherlands

Immigrants and Dutch-born to immigrant parents
Iberian America
Country of originPopulation Population Population Population Population Population
2,9523,2394,1674,5224,2456,508
4085477449541,1701,415
6,5898,91312,28917,02222,04130,104
3,5663,9374,5644,9365,4886,207
4,9377,0259,88512,29215,34618,351
2744446237419701,242
3617811,3611,7482,0522,333
5,3217,3419,84311,60013,65115,206
5591,1211,8832,4663,2003,943
304350453544626752
2293394716048151,034
203269387505670816
1,2511,8022,8944,0545,5487,618
273314403535693843
244278353393470561
215238270281328371
1,8492,4183,6624,9256,1007,324
91101132153199241
8058869971,0691,1351,234
2,2572,9484,0904,9366,0027,420

Other / Dutch Americas
Country of originPopulation Population Population Population Population Population
2745921,2042,2504,1305,610
203982
*1564
* 86,550106,605129,334136,170144,565154,510

French Latin America
Country of originPopulation Population Population Population Population Population
401477707716767836
194219306301327397
223331540619703865
8594105106121123

Portugal

In 2008, Portugal's foreign population grew 1% from 435,736 in 2007 to 440,277. One in four immigrants is Brazilian, and Portugal was a country for an increasing amount of Venezuelans.
There are also other communities from Argentina, the latter can have Portuguese ancestry due to the historical ties between both nations.
Country of birthPopulation Corresponding article
139,703Brazilians in Portugal
25,157

Switzerland

In 2013 there were a total of 1,937,447 permanent foreign residents in Switzerland. Of these, 51,761 were from Latin America and the Caribbean.

Italy

The list is not complete, as it does not include some Latin Americans that have gotten citizenship via jus sanguinis.
RankCountry of originPopulation
1.99,110
2.83,120
3.45,410
4.28,002
5.20,986
6.17,968
7.14,076
8.13,492
9.8,009
10.6,327
11.4,211
12.3,167
13.2,015
14.1,781
15.1,248

Sweden

Ireland



European Union ''(in general)''

Total amount of latinos residing in the European Union ; ~3.843.026