The forgotten of Venezuelan migration: the human cost for those who stayed

By Rosa Virginia Cabrera Carpio.

Over the past decade, Venezuelan migration has been analyzed mainly from the perspective of those who left the country and the difficulties they meet in the nations that receive them. There is another reality, far less visible: that of the millions of Venezuelans who stayed, and who have had to carry the emotional, social and economic consequences of family separation.

International organizations have documented at length the risks faced by migrant women, girls and families. Those same reports also make it possible to understand that migration produces deep effects on the people who remain in the place of origin. The transnational family can ease poverty through remittances, but it rarely replaces physical presence, emotional accompaniment, or the daily work of care.

One of the most serious impacts is the fragmentation of the family. Thousands of children have grown up separated from one or both parents, while many older adults depend on nothing more than phone calls and money transfers. Prolonged absence changes how a family works, raises the burden of care on the women who remain in Venezuela, and produces feelings of abandonment, anxiety and extended grief.

UNICEF reports emphasize that migration processes can expose girls, adolescents and women to multiple forms of violence, and that family separation constitutes a vulnerability requiring comprehensive responses. They also stress the need to strengthen the mechanisms that protect children’s emotional wellbeing and preserve family bonds where migration is unavoidable.

Women who remain in Venezuela usually take on the roles of mother, caregiver to older relatives, and household manager all at once. That overload increases stress, limits their employment prospects, and deepens gender inequality. At the same time, many migrant women face discrimination, informal work and greater risk of exploitation, which bears directly on the stability of the families depending on them. The International Labour Organization has documented these barriers to the socioeconomic integration of Venezuelan migrant women.

Older adults are another group that is often forgotten. Many live alone after their children and grandchildren have gone, with support networks that keep shrinking. Remittances may cover basic needs, but they do not replace the daily care and emotional company an ageing population requires.

Economically, remittances have kept countless Venezuelan households alive. Yet depending on income sent from abroad creates new vulnerabilities of its own: families are exposed to economic swings in the receiving country, to shifts in migration policy, or to the migrant relative losing their job. Remittances also fail to compensate for the loss of human capital that follows the mass departure of professionals, technicians and skilled workers.

At the same time, a reality backed by evidence deserves recognition: Venezuelan migration has also generated significant economic and social contributions in the countries that receive it. Studies by the International Organization for Migration show that Venezuelan migrants contribute billions of dollars annually to Latin American economies through consumption, employment, entrepreneurship and taxes.

For that reason, the debate should not be reduced to treating migration as purely positive or purely negative. Migration has been an opportunity for millions of Venezuelans seeking safety and better conditions of life. It has also carried enormous emotional costs for the families who stayed behind. Both things can be true, and both deserve to be named.

The real challenge is designing public policy that strengthens family reunification, psychosocial support, protection for women who provide care, attention to older adults, and the development of opportunity inside Venezuela, so that emigrating becomes a choice again rather than a necessity.

The big headlines tend to concentrate on the people crossing borders. But the story of Venezuelan migration also belongs to those who wait for a call, who celebrate birthdays through a screen, or who grow old without their children nearby. They are, in all likelihood, the least visible faces of the largest migration crisis in Latin America’s recent history.