Movements of population

Geography of Pakistan · Population and employment. The idea in plain words, the rules to remember, the mistake to avoid and a worked example, written and checked by Mega Lecture.

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The idea

Migration is the movement of people to live in a new place. Push factors are problems that drive people away from where they live, such as few farm jobs, drought, floods and poor services. Pull factors are attractions of the new place, such as factory jobs, higher wages, schools and hospitals.

The main movement inside Pakistan is rural–urban migration. Cities cannot house everyone, so migrants build unplanned settlements called katchi abadis, which lack clean water and drains. Villages lose young workers but gain money sent home.

People also move between countries. Many Pakistanis work in the Gulf, and many Afghan refugees came to Pakistan after 1979.

Rules to remember

Emigration = leaving a country to live elsewhere. Immigration = coming into a country to live.
Seasonal migration = moving for part of the year and then returning, such as herders moving flocks between high and low pastures.
Refugee = a person forced to leave their country by war, persecution or disaster. Afghan refugees came from 1979, after the Soviet invasion.
Katchi abadi = unplanned squatter settlement of poorly built homes. Tent city = temporary camp after a flood or earthquake.
Rural depopulation: villages lose young adults, leaving the old, women and children to farm.
Emigration brings remittances but loses skilled people such as doctors and engineers.
Self-help scheme: residents improve their own area with advice, as in the Orangi Pilot Project in Karachi (lane sewers).

Common mistake

Students label a city’s attractions as push factors. Push factors always describe the place people leave; pull factors always describe the place they go to.

Worked example

A landlord near Bahawalpur buys a combine harvester. A farm labourer loses his work and moves with his family to Faisalabad, where he finds a job in a textile mill. Name the type of migration, one push factor and one pull factor.

The family moves from a village to a city inside Pakistan, and for good.
The reason for leaving describes the village: farm jobs lost to machines.
The reason for choosing Faisalabad describes the city: work in the mills.

Answer: Rural–urban migration. Push: mechanisation removed farm work. Pull: factory jobs in the city.

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