With an 80% increase in new applications compared to 2020, the last two quarters of 2021 recorded a sharp rise in the number of asylum seekers in the Netherlands.
According to Statistics Netherlands, this record hike consists of two elements: the number of people submitting their first asylum application and the number of family members travelling to the Netherlands as part of the family reunification process.
While the number of first applications currently sits at 25,000, over 10,000 family members travelled to the Netherlands as part of the family reunification process last year. This is two and a half times as many as in 2020.
Timeline and numbers
In 2020, the Netherlands saw only 13,720 new asylum applications due to an overall low international travel and coronavirus restrictions which partially closed the Dutch borders.
But things began to change last September when the Dutch Immigration and Naturalisation Service (IND) saw the first glimpse of a hike.
This was partly due to the escalating situation in Afghanistan and the evacuation and arrival of Afghans to the Netherlands.
From that point, the number of new asylum applications started increasing once more, creating an overflow at asylum centres. The fourth quarter of 2021 saw the largest number of asylum applications, namely 9,870.
Currently, individuals from Syria form the largest group (34%) of new applicants, followed by Afghans and Turks. Syrians also formed two thirds of asylum-seeking family members coming as part of the family reunification process last year.
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Feature Image: Peter de Ruiter/Flickr
