I begin by saying that I have been an emigrant. Unlike millions of Colombians and Latino Americans, I did not have to leave my country through dangerous borders, I did it with a passport, visa and the money necessary to start a new life. I did very well in the country that welcomed me along with my family. I started businesses and I was successful in that experience of about four decades ago. However, my experience is not the norm for Latin American immigrants. From 12 million migrants in the 1970s to more than 50 million by 2020, the number grows exponentially and is expected to exceed 100 million by the end of 2030.

The question is: Why do Latin Americans emigrate? Well, this phenomenon has been caused by different factors, physical and real need for subsistence are some of the first reasons, since our countries do not offer fair and necessary opportunities to the working population, people do not find work and if they do, is precarious and underpaid. Other causes are economic difficulties, children who receive a poor education, lack of access to basic social needs that seek to improve the standard of living, something they manage to find in receiving countries where the labor force is well paid, higher and accessible social guarantees and by receiving their income in a strong currency such as the dollar, allows them to send money to their families in so-called remittances, thus making a saving that provides a capital to start a business or guarantee a future income.

There are also other insurmountable causes such as violence, insecurity, corrupt and tyrannical governments. Thus we can see that Cubans, Venezuelans, Nicaraguans and other countries with socialist and populist governments, are the ones who most leave their country in search of better luck. Colombia has received close to three million Venezuelans, some stay, others go to the north and south of the continent, sadly we see many of them walking along the roads, carrying small children in their arms living on charity, the vast majority stripping themselves of their little money they managed to get, to be shorn by border traffickers and coyotes who profit themselves from this human need, as well as the drama that thousands are suffering at this time on the U.S. border because of Title 42.

The hope of a better life is pointed towards the  United States, the country that receives the most emigrants of all nationalities, from those who arrive with a visa and decide to stay, to those who illegally cross the Rio Bravo. It is followed in second place by Spain for the ease of language and its migration policies. Of course, they also reach other European countries that receive migrants, although to a lesser extent than Africans who invade Europe, but in general this phenomenon will continue as long as there are disastrous governments in these countries that elect inept and corrupt rulers who enrich themselves and perpetuate themselves in power by impoverishing their society.

Although it is true that Latin America is a young and promising continent that has been built autonomously for some two hundred years, the ethnographic mixture of ancestral indigenous cultures with colonizing Europeans, created an influence of its own that contributed to the formation of the Latin American people under Spanish, French or Italian patterns primarily. The indigenous influence has predominated in other cases such as in Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia that carry their Inca heritage and in Mexico and Central America from the Mayan culture.

(*) Colombian businessman, social communicator, journalist and television producer. Co-founder and President of Teleamiga television channel for 17 years.