According to a report by the international monetary fund in 1998, Iran is not among the top 10 countries in terms of brain drain from the perspective of exit rate of graduates and their arrival in OECD countries with a 25.6% rate.

According to the information center of national elites foundation, quoted by Iran Migration observatory, the elite emigration issue has been one of the serious challenges in the field of elites and has attracted the attention of the media. Evidently, it has provided an opportunity for controversy generators to cause chaos in academic environments of Iran by presenting inaccurate statistics, using the issue to discourage the Iranian population.

In one of the above claims, it is expressed: according to the statistics of the national monetary fund, Iran was ranked first among 91 countries of the world in terms of brain drain. These statistics show that 150-180 thousand graduates of Iran leave the country on an annual basis.

The claim is made while such statistics have never been published by the IMF on brain drain in Iran.

In the report by IMF in 1998, Iran was ranked 11^th among 61 countries regarding the exit of graduates and their travel to OECD countries with a 25.6% rate.

It is interesting that the same report points out that the total number of Iranian graduates in the United States was 105 thousand people in 1990.

Moreover, a review of the source and other references and related reports casts doubt on the validity of this statement. The report is cited by the media and authorities as related to a research conducted by the IMF nearly two decades ago in 1998.

The same report estimates the number of educated Iranian immigrants in the United States in 1990 at 105,526 and the total number of Iranians in the United States at 150,906. In addition, 70% of the Iranian emigrants in Iran had academic degrees.

Iran was ranked sixth among Asian countries regarding the rate of emigration of graduates (the ratio of emigrants with academic degrees to the total number of emigrants of the country in the United States).

Source: Iran Gate Emigration File

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