- The next step after having identified, analysed and evaluated the risks involves the identification and reporting of further actions that will assist in managing these risks.
- The risk treatment process is based on the evaluation and assessment of risks’ impact, likelihood and consequences which are used to establish the timeframe and necessity of actions towards the mitigation of threats and vulnerabilities. Using this, the risk treatment and mitigation plans can be specified and allocated to the relevant parties.
- Management or treatment plans for risks and vulnerabilities to the organization might be the following:
- Avoiding risk by deciding to stop, postpone, cancel or divert with an activity that contributed
to the cause of that risk. - Decreasing the evaluated likelihood and impacts of the risk in order to reduce or eliminate the negative outcomes.
- Addressing the consequences in a way that will reduce losses and negative effects
- Retaining the risk or its residual risks by applying monitoring and control measures.
- Avoiding risk by deciding to stop, postpone, cancel or divert with an activity that contributed
- In general, the cost of risk management and treatment plans need to be compared with the benefits obtained or expected.
- It is important to consider all direct and indirect costs and benefits, whether they can be quantified or not, in order to ensure more effective and productive results.
- Action plans are necessary, as they describe how the chosen risk measures will be implemented.
- Additionally, action plans include the corresponding risk process owners who are responsible for managing and overseeing specific risk management processes or risk areas.
- Risk process owner ensures that the risks are identified, assessed, managed, and mitigated in alignment with the organization’s risk management framework and strategic objectives.
- Furthermore, the action plans should be comprehensive and should provide all necessary information about the following:
- The implementation of the proposed measures.
- Implementation dates/ time plans.
- Roles and responsibilities of all risk process owners involved in the proposed measures.
- Specify if the proposed measures have to be repeated on a regular basis.
- Reporting and monitoring requirements.
- The risk response plan and risk strategies represent the final part of the risk assessment process.
- The following primary strategies for responding to identifying migration related risks, are considered:
- Avoidance: This strategy entails completely removing the risk by making adjustments to plans, procedures, or activities that avoid it. Additionally, this method consists of controls and quick actions to prevent and minimize risks.
- Reduction/Mitigation: The goal of mitigation is to lessen a risk’s likelihood or effect. This could entail putting in place safeguards or control mechanisms to reduce the risk’s possible repercussions in the event that it materializes or to reduce the possibility that it will occur.
- Monitoring: Throughout a project, initiative, or organization’s lifecycle, risks are systematically tracked, assessed, and reviewed as part of risk monitoring. It’s a crucial part of risk management that guarantees both the timely identification and swift handling of newly discovered risks. This plan also includes best practices that governments and border security authorities may implement to improve their capacity to proactively detect, evaluate, and manage risks. This will help them make better decisions, safeguard organizational value, and become more resilient to unpredictability.
- Acceptance: Sometimes avoiding, reducing, or monitoring the risk is not practical or economical. In certain situations, the corresponding organization may decide to take the risk, admitting its existence and indicating its willingness to handle any possible fallout as it develops. This is choosing not to take any specific action to handle the risk on purpose, not that the danger is ignored.
- To implement these strategies, as described above, we need relevant measures, controls, interventions and best practices to be associated with each risk strategy. Therefore, as described in a set of recommended controls and actions have been defined (see table below).
- The list include preventive actions and legislative measures, some of which are already adopted and are now being implemented, while others continue to be discussed by legislators.
- In addition to official policies, we have also included a number of controls based on recommendations of non-governmental stakeholders who have extensive experience in working with irregular migrants and victims of trafficking.
- This is due to the fact that research has shown that irregular migration and counter-smuggling policies are often based on limited empirical data, collected from specific groups of stakeholders. This results in recommendations that both privilege Euro-centric perspectives and law enforcement priorities to the detriment of migrant views which are either simplified under the label of victimisation and abuse, or are completely absent (Sanchez, 2021).
| No | Control Description | Related Source |
|---|---|---|
| C1 | Implementation of equal access to safe, legal and orderly paths to migration. This would include ensuring timely access to a fair asylum procedure on arrival, or to other alternatives for regularisation of people’s status in transit and in a destination context. It would also involve setting-up partnerships with origin and transit countries, focused on setting-up visa schemes that would increase the number and range of legal migration routes | Sanchez, 2021 ICMPD Policy Brief, 2019 Martini & Megerisi, ECFR, 2023 |
| C2 | Design and introduction of temporary migration programmes. This would be based on a system of temporary employment migration, with enhanced options for return migrants to become economically active in their countries of origin. This system involves admission of temporary workers from selected developing countries for up to seven years, complemented by free education and occupational training and a financial return incentive. This would be capital accumulated over the working period in the host country through social security savings, pension savings and a share of development aid money. Additionally, there would be schemes for facilitating the investment of the return premiumthrough, for instance, business start-up training, tax breaks and microcredit schemes. | UNODC, 2010 |
| C3 | Expand alternatives for regular travel. This would include significantly expanding the range of alternatives for regular travel for people on the move, including regular migration (e.g., labour migration, family reunification) and regular travel for refugees (e.g., resettlement, community sponsorship, humanitarian visas). | ICMPD Policy Brief, 2019 |
| C4 | Implement measures to ensure that families can remain together. Ensure that families remain together: in countries of origin, by providing alternatives; in transit countries, by allowing families to travel and reside together, and to reunite if they become separated; and in destination countries, through family reunification. Individually assess members of a group to ensure that those claiming to be family members are in fact related, and to identify any abuses taking place in a family context | ICMPD Policy Brief, 2019 |
| C5 | Ensure protection of unaccompanied and separated children transitioning into adulthood | ICMPD Policy Brief, 2019 |
| C6 | Incorporate special measures related to people on the move into trafficking screening, identification, referral, protection and prosecution mechanisms. This would include applying non-punishment provisions to people on the move who have been trafficked and building the capacities of asylum authorities to identify trafficked people | ICMPD Policy Brief, 2019 |
| C7 | Investigate suspected cases of migrant smuggling for indications of trafficking, exploitation and abuse | ICMPD Policy Brief, 2019 |
| C8 | Establishing an evaluation mechanism to verify the correct application of Schengen rules | European Commission, 2024 Irregular migration and return |
| C9 | Considering the feasibility of creating a European system of border guards | Irregular migration and return |
| C10 | Humane and effective return policy, following the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights. This would include the possibility of extending period of voluntary departure (e.g. to enable children to finish school); to provide independent information, counselling and support should be provided to potential returnees and their families, examining all options including other means of regularization in the host-country as well as helping them to prepare for return. It should ensure voluntary departure is an option at the end of a fair asylum procedure. | Irregular migration and return ECRE, 2018 |
| C11 | Identification the fight against migrant smuggling as a priority to prevent the exploitation of migrants by criminal networks | Irregular migration and return |
| C12 | Strengthening operational cooperation, and information exchange between EU countries and EU law enforcement agencies to investigate, and prosecute migrant smuggling networks | Irregular migration and return |
| C13 | Ensuring that victims of trafficking have access to assistance, including the possibility of a temporary residence in the EU | Irregular migration and return |
| C14 | Ensuring that employers who employ irregular migrants are appropriately sanctioned, and that the irregular migrants can exercise their rights to claim back wages and social contributions | Irregular migration and return |
| C15 | Improving the exchange of information on migration, adopting a coordinated approach in cooperation with third country authorities. Any cooperation should include detailed human rights impact analyses and analyses of the impact on local political economies where such policies will be implemented. This analysis cannot be carried out in the aggregate and must be conducted on a case-by-case basis for all affected communities in each implementing country. Careful considerations must be made to ensure that third country partners’ migration management activities do not impede individuals’ right to seek asylum. | Irregular migration and return Fallone, 2021 |
| C16 | Enhancing stability, education and employment opportunities, as well as improve conditions that cause forced migration | How to solve migration: a practical guide, IOM UN Migration |
| C17 | Implementing radical changes to the way research on migrant smuggling and trafficking is created and data analysed. This involves expanding the web of informants and stakeholders but also diversifying the body of researchers and research entities traditionally tasked with conducting smuggling research. | Sanchez, 2021 How to solve migration: a practical guide, IOM UN Migration |
| C18 | Policy responses must take into consideration how migrants and those behind their journeys experience enforcement and controls. | Sanchez, 2021 |
| C19 | Cooperation at national and regional level can contribute toward the elimination of negative aspects of migration and enhance human capital and sustainable growth to preserve economic development | How to solve migration: a practical guide, IOM UN Migration |
| C20 | Countries of origin of irregular migrants should improve public information and/or education about the risks of irregular migration, such as traffickers, smugglers or forced labour migration, as well as the laws and practices related to irregular migrants in destination countries | Measures to Prevent or Reduce Irregular Labour Migration |
| C21 | Improve border control efficiency by eradicating any form of corruption | Measures to Prevent or Reduce Irregular Labour Migration |
| C22 | Protect human rights of migrants | Measures to Prevent or Reduce Irregular Labour Migration |
| C23 | Increased cooperation between country of origin of irregular migrants and destination country | Measures to Prevent or Reduce Irregular Labour Migration |
| C24 | Strengthen the EU's external border management and security | Countering irregular migration: better EU border management | Topics | European Parliament (europa.eu) |
| C25 | Faster asylum decisions at external EU borders | Countering irregular migration: better EU border management | Topics | European Parliament (europa.eu) |
| C26 | Monitoring the conditions that force migration helps identify the political, social, economic, and cultural forces that drive the phenomenon | Monitoring and Protecting Human Rights in the Context of Migration |
| C27 | Intra-agency cooperation - Establish intra-agency relations to enhance “operational procedures, reporting and communication, methods of analysis, and coordination of workflow mechanisms” in line with national legislation | Good Practices in the area of BSM in the Context of Counterterrorism and Stemming the Flow of “Foreign Terrorist Fighters”, UNCCT |
| C28 | Inter-agency cooperation - Enhance cooperation among State agencies to improve cooperation among relevant departments at national, regional, and local level | Good Practices in the area of BSM in the Context of Counterterrorism and Stemming the Flow of “Foreign Terrorist Fighters”, UNCCT |
| C29 | International cooperation - Enhance cooperation among States within international, regional, and other multilateral organizations in the areas of research, analysis, and intelligence. | Good Practices in the area of BSM in the Context of Counterterrorism and Stemming the Flow of “Foreign Terrorist Fighters”, UNCCT |
| C30 | Develop border community policing - Community policing is a policing method designed to address local crime and disorder | Good Practices in the area of BSM in the Context of Counterterrorism and Stemming the Flow of “Foreign Terrorist Fighters”, UNCCT |
| C31 | Enhance border security and management (BSM) information exchange programs and mechanisms - Collect information from different agencies to improve risk analysis | Good Practices in the area of BSM in the Context of Counterterrorism and Stemming the Flow of “Foreign Terrorist Fighters”, UNCCT |
| C32 | Border Cooperation Centres - To improve communication, coordination, and cooperation between neighbouring border services and law enforcement agencies | Good Practices in the area of BSM in the Context of Counterterrorism and Stemming the Flow of “Foreign Terrorist Fighters”, UNCCT |
| C33 | Enhance risk analysis - Improve risk analyses to enhance BSM at national and cross-border level | Good Practices in the area of BSM in the Context of Counterterrorism and Stemming the Flow of “Foreign Terrorist Fighters”, UNCCT |
| C34 | Establish Joint Border Crossing Points - Improve border infrastructure to enhance security | Good Practices in the area of BSM in the Context of Counterterrorism and Stemming the Flow of “Foreign Terrorist Fighters”, UNCCT |
| C35 | Eliminate corruption from BSM-related agencies enhance governance and border security to improve human rights issues | Good Practices in the area of BSM in the Context of Counterterrorism and Stemming the Flow of “Foreign Terrorist Fighters”, UNCCT |
| C36 | Ensuring that any counter-smuggling effort relying on social media data mining is in line with European law and that it protects the rule of law and human rights of migrants and asylum seekers. In this context, efforts to curtail social media content related to the facilitation of irregular migration must neither remove information informing potential migrants about safe routes of passage and places to stay, nor remove information regarding the trustworthiness or risks of certain smuggling service providers | Sanchez, 2021 Fallone, 2021 |
| C37 | Fund and support civil society, including social and legal service providers working with migrants and victims of trafficking | National Immigrant Justice Center, 2023 |
| C38 | Implement a more nuanced approach to prosecution of migrant smuggling. This would focus on one hand on preventing undue prosecutions of migrants who perform smuggling-related tasks, especially in contexts such as when individuals in an abandoned group of migrants take charge in order to complete the journey. Such individuals may be identified as “organizers” and subjected to prosecutions that are disproportionate to their role and disregarding their right to assistance and protection as smuggled migrants.Secondly, laws on smuggling or the facilitation of irregular entry, transit or stay should clearly prevent the criminalisation of human rights defenders assisting refugees, asylum seekers and migrants, including by ensuring that the ‘financial or material’ gain criterion is central to any definition of criminality. | IOM, 2017 CoE Recommendation,2024 |
| C39 | Meaningful and Transparent Processes to Assess Digital Border Technologies Prior to Deployment. This means that no digital border technologies should be procured or deployed without public disclosure and scrutiny of the plans to deploy them ahead of time. Public scrutiny of proposals must not be facilitated as a ‘tick-box’ exercise but should allow for the possibility that the proposed technology will not be procured or used when it presents too high a risk to human rights or safeguards are inadequate or ineffective. | UNHCR, 2023 |
| C40 | Regular review and ongoing oversight of digital border technologies | UNHCR, 2023 |
| C41 | Access to adequate and effective remedies. This would include the creation of an impartial and independent complaints-handling bodies should be put in place with competence to receive and investigate complaints in relation to border governance and to issue binding decisions aimed at holding actors to account for human rights harms and ensuring that migrants and refugees receive adequate and effective remedies and reparation | UNHCR, 2023 |
- The next step is linking controls with risk strategies. This part or the risk assessment process involves sets of recommended controls and best practises that links to specific risk evaluation strategies (Avoidance, Reduction, Monitoring or Acceptance).
- The objective behind this mapping exercise, is to help or advise the corresponding authorities or policymakers and the management team to have in mind what actions and measures are recommended for each specific risk based on the risk evaluation process.
- Therefore, When the risk is high with the corresponding risk strategy being “Avoidance”, then we suggest a set of “Mitigation” controls that need to be applied for the risk avoidance and control. Similarly, as the risk is decreasing and the risk strategy changes from “Reduction” to “Monitoring” and finally to “Acceptance”, then the applied controls should move from “Mitigation” to “Monitoring” and “Acceptance” controls to address and monitor the risk. The intuition is that, for example the “Mitigation” or “Reduction” controls are more intense and urgent, while the “Monitoring” and “Acceptance” controls which include best practices and recommendations are used for monitoring and improving the situation related to the risk.
- Note, however, that a specific control may be relevant to multiple risk categories. To this end, each risk category has a list of associated controls that need to be applied.
- The following table is an extension of the Risk Evaluation Matrix, which shows a set of recommended controls and best practises, namely C1-C41, depending on the level of risk associated with the corresponding strategy.
- This mapping of recommended controls and best practises can be used as a guidance to support the risk management team to their decisions and actions to prevent or mitigate the corresponding risks but of course it should be updated and/or extended on a regular basis.
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