Commenting on the 2023 Migration and Asylum Report, which indicated an increase of one-third in the foreign population compared to 2022, totalling 1,044,606 citizens, Pedro Portugal Gaspar stated that it is now necessary to promote integration and rejected the idea that there is an anti-immigrant sentiment in Portugal.

“I don’t think these figures demonstrate a huge wave of migration”, but “objectively they do pose challenges for Portuguese society”.

In recent weeks, there have been attacks against immigrants in Porto and several association leaders have warned of xenophobic discourse in sectors of Portuguese society and politics, but Pedro Portugal Gaspar believes that “these are relatively residual situations”, compared to one million foreigners in Portugal.

The objective data do not indicate this trend, said the president of AIMA, stressing that it is “important to understand the migratory flow in a global logic” and of “crossing populations worldwide”.

The report makes it possible to systematise the data and prepare responses to existing needs.

AIMA replaced the Foreigners and Borders Service (SEF) in October 2023 and now the priority is “legalisation and the bureaucratic administrative aspect” to resolve the 400,000 pending immigrant processes, counted in December 2023.


Integration

However, integration is “a medium-term challenge and we cannot lose sight of this integrated approach, which is the purpose of the Agency’s work in this area”, he stated, recalling that the movement of migrants corresponds to “a centuries-old dynamic” and “is not new”.

This integration work “is not carried out exclusively” by AIMA, but in collaboration with local authorities, civil society and companies, “with a logic of territorial cohesion and integration”.

According to the Agency for Integration, Migration and Asylum (AIMA), the number of legal foreigners in Portugal has more than doubled in six years, rising from 480,300 in 2017 to over one million last year.

Among the most representative nationalities, 35.3% are Brazilians (368,449 people), followed by 55,589 Angolans (5.3%), 48,885 Cape Verdeans (4.7%), 47,709 British (4.5%), 44,051 Indians (4.2%), 36,227 Italians (3.5%), 32,535 Guineans (3.1%), 29,972 Nepalese (2.9%), 27,873 Chinese (2.7%), 27,549 French (2.6%) and 26,460 São Toméans (2.5%).

In 2023, the number of residence permits granted more than doubled (328,978), corresponding to an increase of 130 percent compared to 2022, a year that had already seen a 28.5% increase compared to 2022.

The “migratory flow shows a substantial increase compared to previous years, with emphasis on the Residence Permit for citizens of the Community of Portuguese Speaking Countries (CPLP)”, corresponding to 45.3% of the total, the report states.