Green Card Lottery Regional Statistics

The Diversity Visa Program, also called the Green Card Lottery, is an immigration program designed to bring people who might not otherwise have the opportunity to the U.S. to live as permanent residents.

This program has been running for many years and has been considered something of a success. However, recent congressional legislation may bring it to a swift end in the year to come.

The upshot of such an event would be that 2013 would be the last year of the lottery.

This makes it all the more important to apply as soon as one can for the 2013 registration period.

The lottery attempts to make the distribution of immigration visas fair by ensuring no more than 3,500 visas are granted to individuals from one country.

However, there is no such limitation on regions and regions are often given some degree of advantage. Africa and Central Asia seem to receive the greater degree of Green Cards from this program.

The below figures are all from the 2012 Green Card Lottery. This lottery’s registration period took place in 2010.

  • Africa was the region which received the largest number of Green Cards with 50 percent of the allocated Green Cards issued to Africans
  • Africa also has the largest occurrence of fraud of any of the regions. Most of the applications from African nations were fraudulent in nature
  • Of all the Asian countries allowed to participate in the Green Card Lottery, Iran received the most Green Cards in the program
  • North America received the fewest Green Cards of any region. This may be explained by the fact that not many countries are eligible for the lottery in North America
  • Applicants from Oceania (island nations in the Pacific Ocean) had the highest likelihood to win the Green Card Lottery of any region