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TEMPLATE Bios

Daniela Ghio

Research Affiliate
EducationPhD, Université de Montréal
Areas of ExpertisePopulation studies and demographic challenges, demographic methods, migration policy and integration, asylum, internal mobility and regional trends

Daniela investigates population dynamics and contributes to evidence-based policy decisions. She earned her PhD in Demography from the Université de Montréal and specializes in migration and integration policy. She studied economics, statistics, law, and political sciences at the University of Pisa. 

Daniela adopts demographic methods and econometric approaches to analyze the social and human capital determinants of migration and assess the impacts of spatial patterns on population dynamics. Most of her work has taken a comparative perspective, looking across geographic regions at a scale ranging from global to high-spatial resolutions, as well as from developing to developed countries. She applies micro-macro projection models to detect the long-term effects of the current population trends, exploring future demographic challenges and scenarios on population vulnerability to environmental and climate risks.

Daniela currently holds a teaching position at University of Catania, Department of Political Sciences. Prior to this, she was Senior Research Associate, CERC Migration. She has collaborated with international, European, and national institutions, and held assistant teaching positions in migration and demographic methods. She worked as scientific expert at the Joint Research Centre of the European Commission, examining the demographic and social determinants of migration and mobility at local, regional, and international levels. Daniela has served the Italian Ministry of Interior, contributing to the impact assessment of migration and integration policy actions, under the framework of the European Commission’s Asylum, Migration, and Integration Fund. Daniela was part of the European Asylum Support-Office, aimed at the development of the Common European Asylum System, to enhance the governance of international migration through the cooperation and social dialogue among the main stakeholders engaged in asylum-related activities.

Recent Publications

Journal Articles

With Goujon,  A., Natale, F,. Alredo, A., Petroliagkis, F. (2023). Assessing populations exposed to climate change: A focus on Africa in a global context (external link) . Population and Environment 45,(8).

With Bignami-Van Assche, S., & Stilianakis, N. I. (2023). Demographic risk factors, healthcare utilization, and mortality during the first year of the Covid-19 pandemic in Austria, Germany, and Italy. (external link)  Population Studies, 1-12.

With Bratti, M., & Bignami, S. (2023). Does speaking or writing Italian make differences? (external link)  International Migration.

With Bosco, C., Natale, F., Loeschner, J., & Goujon, A. (2022). Age patterns of net migration and urbanisation dynamics across European municipalities. (external link)  Population, Space and Place.

With Bignami-Van Assche, S., & Stilianakis, N. I. (2022). Demographics of COVID-19 hospitalisations and related fatality risk patterns (external link) Health Policy, 126 - 19, 945 - 955.

With Goujon, A., & Natale, F. (2022). Assessing the demographic impact of migration on the working-age population across European territories. (external link)  Demographic Research, 46, 261 - 272. 

With Bratti, M., & Bignami, S. (2022). Linguistic Barriers to Immigrants’ Labor Market Integration in Italy (external link) . International Migration Review, 1 - 38.

With Acosta, E., Fisman, D., Noymer, A., Stilianakis, N. I., & Assche, S. B. V. (2021). Population health and COVID-19 in Canada: A demographic comparative perspective (external link) Canadian studies in population, 48, 131 - 137.

With Bignami-Van Assche, S., Boujija, Y., & Stilianakis, N. I. (2021). Beware of regional heterogeneity when assessing the role of schools in the SARS-CoV-2 second wave in Italy. (external link)  The Lancet Regional Health–Europe, 7, 100174.

With Goujon A, Natale F. and Conte A. (2021) Demographic and territorial characteristics of COVID-19 cases and excess mortality in the European Union during the first wave (external link) . Journal of Population Research 39,  533–556.

Policy Reports

With Natale F., Alessandrini A., Goujon A., Petroliagkis T. (2021), Population exposure and migrations linked to climate change in Africa (external link) EUR 30881 EN, Publications Office of the European Union, Luxembourg.

With Grubanov Boskovic S., Goujon A., Kalantaryan S., Belmonte M., Scipioni M., et al. (2021), Health and long-term care workforce: demographic challenges and the potential contribution of migration and digital technology. (external link)  EUR 30593 EN, Publications Office of the European Union, Luxembourg.

With Aurambout, J.P., Batista E Silva, F., Bosco, C., Conte, A., Kalantaryan, S., et al. (2021), The Demographic Landscape of European Union Territorie (external link) s (external link) . EUR 30498 EN, Publications Office of the European Union, Luxembourg.