CBI Guide – the independent guide to citizenship and residency by investment programmes, digital nomad visas, and golden visas – has passed two significant milestones.
Designed as a utopia for remote workers, and located on the Portuguese archipelago of Madeira, the world’s first official digital nomad village offers free workspace and wifi for those staying a month or more.
As countries continue to roll out long-stay visas for foreigners in an attempt to replace lost tourism dollars and to attract remote workers, Singapore announces the launch in 2021 of a Tech.Pass visa programme offering tech entrepreneurs from across the world the chance to set up and operate companies in the southeast Asia trading hub.
Adding to the globe's growing list of digital nomad visas introduced in 2020 is Work in Iceland, a programme that allows foreign national remote workers the chance to reside in, and work remotely from, the stunning country of Iceland with their family for up to six months.
Following the unveiling of a raft of remote working visas in the last six months, Greece and Croatia are the latest nations to roll out the red carpet for global remote workers, with programmes designed to lure digital expats to their shores in a bid to replace the lost tourism dollars due to the pandemic.
Just one of a raft of remote working visas unveiled worldwide in the last five months, Antigua and Barbuda’s Nomad Digital Residence (NDR) Programme, which invites remote-working foreigners to reside on the island for up to 24 months, has witnessed a high number of applicants, especially from the US, UK and Canada, and has been receiving up to seven inquiries per day since its launch in September.
The Caribbean island of Antigua & Barbuda, which runs a successful citizenship by investment programme that includes the option of investment in eco-friendly resorts, has been named 2021’s Emerging Sustainable Destination of the Year in global travel authority Lonely Planet’s Best in Travel Awards 2021.
Following eight months of uncertainty thanks to Covid, the British Virgin Islands (BVI) is the latest nation to announce investor visa programmes aimed at replacing lost tourism dollars. Both the proposed Invest-and-Stay and In-Stay programmes will provide foreigners with residency/remote working visas in exchange for investment.
The pandemic has brought with it the opportunity to work remotely and the desire to reside somewhere pandemic-free. And with tourism-dependent countries desperate to replace lost dollars, a flood of digital nomad visa programmes has hit the market in recent months, extending the portfolio of opportunities offered by the global citizenship and residency by investment industry.
In July 2020, the tourism-reliant Caribbean island of Barbados unveiled a 12-month visa to attract remote workers, and then in September, announced its intention to become a republic next year. With the pandemic having hit its tourism sector hard, could Barbados be revisit its plan from 2016 to launch a citizenship by investment programme?