Francesco Carella Profile

Mr. Francesco Carella currently serves as subregional Labour Migration Specialist, based at ILO San José (Costa Rica) and covering Central America, Mexico, Panama, Cuba, Haiti and the Dominican Republic. In this capacity, he advises Governments, as well as employers’ and workers’ organizations, on instruments and strategies to strengthen the governance of labour migration and the protection of migrant workers’ rights; he also oversees relevant projects in his geographic area of responsibility. Francesco joined the ILO in 2013 as Chief Technical Adviser for Labour Migration and Migrant Workers’ Rights, based in Tunis and covering North Africa. Since 2005, he has been working for the United Nations system on a range of migration issues: labour migration, migration and development, forced migration and refugees, trafficking in human beings, migrants’ rights and local integration. In his previous assignments with the UN Secretariat/DPA, IOM, UNDP/Joint Migration and Development Initiative and UNHCR, he has been based in Latin America, in North Africa and in New York. Prior to joining the UN, Francesco worked in London for a local NGO providing support and advisory services to the Latin American refugee and migrant community in the UK.

Francesco Carella holds a BA with Honours in European Social and Political Studies from University College London and a Master’s Degree in Politics and Administration from the College of Europe in Bruges. His Master’s thesis used the case study of relations between Morocco and the European Union to explore the migration-development nexus.

Working languages: English, French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese and passive knowledge of German.