Brain drain: 83% of refugees have higher education, and half of those who left speak Russian at home

Ukrainian refugees want to return to the country, but most of them plan to do so only after it becomes safe here. The results speak for this big study sentiment among Ukrainian refugees from the Razumkov Center.

Portrait of a Ukrainian refugee

The majority of refugees (65%) arrived in their current host country in March of this year.

Among the refugees dominated by women (93%). The largest age groups of respondents are people from 30 to 39 years old (42%) and from 40 to 49 years old (29%). 83% of refugees are people with higher or incomplete higher education.

The most represented among the social groups surveyed are highly qualified specialists (30%), heads of enterprises and their divisions (14%), entrepreneurs (14%), skilled workers (12%), housewives (11%).

For comparison: in January 2022. 15% of Ukrainian citizens consider themselves highly qualified specialists, to the heads of enterprises and their divisions - 1,5%, to entrepreneurs - 4%, to housewives - 6%. That is, there is mass exodus of highly qualified specialists from the country, who are not so numerous and who, due to skills and education, are more likely to get a job in a new place and not want to return to the country later.

Regions of migration

Most of all (45%) refugees left after the start of the war from the central regions of Ukraine (mostly residents of Kyiv (23% of all respondents) and the Kyiv region (9%)), 31% - from the eastern regions, 16% - from the south, 8% - from Western.

74% of respondents are abroad with children, 4% with grandchildren, 23% with husband or wife, 17% with their parents or parents of husband or wife, 9% with other relatives, 4% with friends or acquaintances, 11% are alone.

Intentions to return to the country

Giving an answer about the intentions to return to Ukraine, the following answers were received:

• 36% of respondents expressed their intention to return after they are convinced that it is safe to be in the area where they lived;
• 35% - immediately after the end of the war;
• 13% - a year or several years after the end of the war;
• 7% - after they resume work at the enterprise where they worked or are sure that they will find another job at home;
• 11% plan to return soon;
• 7% do not plan to return at all to Ukraine (among those who have a permanent job in the host country, those are 18%).

More likely to plan to return in the near future, residents of the Western (18%) and central (15%) Regions, while among refugees from the eastern and southern regions, there are only 6% of them. The latter more often express their intention to return after they are convinced that it is safe to be in the area where they lived (among refugees from the Eastern region - 41%, the Southern region - 48%).

Linguistic composition

Very interesting results were shown by the survey in the section of determining the native language and the language of communication at home.

As it turned out, 50,7% of respondents speak Russian at home, but only 20,2% consider Russian as their native language, while 39,7% speak Ukrainian at home, and as many as 69,7% of respondents indicated Ukrainian as their native language. This may indicate precisely the political attitude of refugees to the issue of language: it is now politically correct to call Ukrainian native, but, as we see, it is not necessary to communicate in it at home.

Assessment of the actions of the country's leadership

The actions of the state leadership of Ukraine during the war were assessed positively by 46,2% of respondents, negatively by 12,3%, and 41,5% found it difficult to answer.

Only 17,8% of respondents consider the assistance of the international community to Ukraine sufficient, and 61,1% believe that assistance and support to Ukraine from other countries should be more, one in five found it difficult to answer this question - 21,1%.

We also wrote about in Estonia spoke out against accepting refugees from Ukraine because they speak Russianand told in what cases and with what documents can Ukrainian men leave the country.

Subscribe to our news in Google News
Follow to telegram channel Klymenko Time

Did you like the material? Give him 5 stars. This is important for editors.