Total population | |
---|---|
108,000 | |
Regions with significant populations | |
Throughout Italy. Plurality in Milan, Rome, Bologna, Florence, Modena, Turin | |
Languages | |
Italian · Filipino · Philippine languages · ( Visayan · Kapampangan · Pangasinan) · English | |
Religion | |
Predominantly Roman Catholicism | |
Related ethnic groups | |
Filipinos · Overseas Filipinos |
Filipino Italians are Italians who are either migrants or descendants of migrants from the Philippines. Filipinos form the fifth-largest migrant community in Italy, after the Romanian, Albanian, North African communities and Ukrainians. [1] Italy is one of the largest European migration destination for Filipinos, the others being the UK and Spain. [2] The Italian capital Rome and the city of Milan is home to the largest Filipino community. [2] Roughly 108,000 documented Filipinos reside in Italy as temporary workers or permanent residents, and estimates on the number of undocumented Filipinos vary widely from 20,000 to 80,000. [2] [3] In 2008, ISTAT (Istituto Nazionale di Statistica), Italy’s statistics office, reported that there were 113,686 documented Filipinos living in Italy whereas the number had been 105,675 in 2007. [4]
63% of Filipino Italians are women, [2] and they mostly work as domestic assistants. [1] The Filipino Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) says that Italy allows 5000 non-seasonal/regular workers, up from 3000 in 2007. [5] The DOLE said that the change was "a sign of appreciation of the good bilateral cooperation with the Philippines in migratory issues." [5] There are approximately 60 Filipino organisations in Italy, most of which are church-based, although there are several cultural and civic groups as well. [6] One of such groups is the Filipino Women's Council with the aim of educating Filipino women migrants about their rights and lobbying on their behalf. [7]
In 2007, Italy gave Filipinos with a Filipino driver's license a free Italian driver's license. [8]
In 2007, Filipinos in Italy sent the equivalent of US$500 million back to the Philippines, making it the fourth-largest source of remittances after the U.S., Saudi Arabia and Canada. [9] The town of Mabini in Batangas has extensively benefited from Italian Filipinos; the town has the most former residents living abroad than any other Filipino town or city. [10] Most of those living abroad work in Italy, and a section of Mabini today that has large homes built from remittance money is named "Little Italy". [10] However, due to the economic slump in 2008, remittance money from Italy grew at a much slower pace than usual. [11]