EU nationals account for almost half of new immigrants to the Netherlands

The number of people moving to the Netherlands outstripped the number of people leaving by 81,000 last year, according to new figures from national statistics agency CBS.

In total, 235,000 people, almost half of whom came from another EU country, moved to the Netherlands in 2017, while 154,000 people left. Refugees who had been given residency permits accounted for some 27,000 of the total number of new arrivals.

The CBS says there has been a structural rise in the number of both immigrants and emigrants since World War II but that many migrants do not stay long in the Netherlands.

‘Since 2012, 70% of the people leaving the Netherlands were immigrants while the rest were born in the Netherlands,’ the CBS said.

‘The Dutch economy is booming and this is attracting people,’ migration history professor Leo Lucassen told the Volkskrant. ‘The higher education sector is also attracting a lot of foreign students.’