About two years ago, I wrote a report about hundreds of young people from the city of Irbid who had travelled to the United States through irregular routes.

 At first glance, the problem appeared to be purely economic. But the story was always bigger than that.

Young people were looking for jobs and finding few opportunities. Farmers were selling their land because agriculture was no longer providing enough income. Some of Jordan's most fertile land was gradually being transformed into housing developments, shops, warehouses and roadside restaurants.

At the same time, Irbid has local capital that could be invested inside the governorate, fertile land capable of generating much greater agricultural value, tourist sites that remain largely underdeveloped, and a border with Syria that could become a major economic advantage in the coming years if stability returns and reconstruction gathers pace.

According to the latest figures from Jordan's Department of Statistics, unemployment among Jordanians stood at 21.0% in the second quarter of 2026. In the first quarter, it stood at 21.1%. The first-quarter figures also showed unemployment at 17.7% among Jordanians aged 24 and above, including 14.4% among men and 29.0% among women.

These national figures hide a more difficult reality in governorates where the economy remains heavily dependent on public-sector employment, small-scale trade and services, while productive investment remains limited.

Irbid has a population of more than two million, according to Ministry of Interior figures, and is Jordan's main agricultural governorate. Around 70% of its land is considered arable, accounting for approximately 13.5% of the Kingdom's total arable land.

Yet the governorate faces a number of structural problems, including fragmented agricultural holdings, urban expansion onto farmland, weak agricultural marketing, limited tourism promotion and the movement of part of the available capital towards Amman.

This is where the migration story becomes more understandable.

In a report published by AmmanNet in 2024 on Jordanians attempting to reach the United States through irregular routes, unemployment emerged as one of the pressures influencing young people, particularly university graduates.

It would be inaccurate, however, to claim that everyone who has left northern Jordan for the United States did so because of unemployment. There are also no official statistics that establish that the majority of irregular Jordanian migrants to the United States come from Irbid, Ramtha or Mafraq.

But the repeated cases from northern Jordan, and the connection many migrants themselves make between leaving, the lack of employment opportunities and the search for higher incomes, deserve to be treated as an economic and political warning sign rather than simply another migration story.

The irony is that Irbid is searching for jobs for its young people while sitting on the foundations of several sectors capable of creating employment beyond the traditional public-sector model.

Agriculture is one. Tourism is another. Trade and services linked to the governorate's geographic position provide a third opportunity.

Irbid is more than a university city crowded with restaurants and clothing shops. It sits close to the Syrian border and has historically been part of a wider commercial and geographic corridor connecting Jordan, Syria and Palestine. It also has archaeological and natural sites that remain underdeveloped.

The problem is not a complete absence of tourism assets. It is the limited use of those assets and the shortage of the facilities and services needed to turn them into viable tourism businesses.

Real investment could start with much smaller projects: a viewpoint overlooking one of the governorate's landscapes, a rural restaurant, a farm that receives visitors, a guesthouse, a hiking trail, an agricultural experience built around local produce, a market for rural products, or a recreational space run by young people from the area.

There are already examples of this model in other Jordanian cities, particularly Salt, where small-scale tourism businesses have helped turn local landscapes, food, architecture and rural experiences into economic activities.

These projects do not necessarily require millions of dinars to get started. They need proper site planning, easier licensing procedures, access to small and medium-sized financing, and a clear connection between tourism and agriculture.

This is where the government has a role to play, not by creating another employment programme, but by making it easier for young people to establish businesses that can actually survive.

A young person who owns land, or leases a farm, could dedicate part of it to a tourism experience linked to agricultural production while keeping most of the land productive.

The farmer would then have another source of income without having to sell the land.

That matters because one of Irbid's most serious problems is that agricultural land has increasingly become more attractive as a real-estate asset than as a productive economic asset.

Local reports have documented continued urban expansion onto agricultural land around the plains of Irbid and Ramtha, part of the wider Hauran plain, an area historically known for its fertile soil.

In recent years, parts of these areas have been transformed into concrete developments as land values have risen while agricultural returns have been squeezed by production costs and weak marketing.

The Hauran plain is one of the most important agricultural areas in the Levant. The plains around Irbid and Ramtha historically produced wheat, legumes and other crops. Jordan was once able to produce enough wheat to export some of its agricultural surplus. Today, the picture is dramatically different, and urban expansion is one of the pressures contributing to the decline of agricultural land.

Protecting farmland from urban expansion will not work if the landowner continues to see construction as more profitable than farming.

It is difficult to ask farmers to preserve their land while leaving them to deal with rising production costs, water expenses, labour costs and weak access to markets.

The answer is to make agriculture a profitable investment.

That means moving beyond the sale of raw crops towards food processing, packaging, storage, digital marketing, supply chains and exports.

Irbid could become a centre for food industries built around its own agricultural production.

Olive oil, grains, vegetables, fruit, dairy products, honey and herbs could move from small farms selling their products individually into integrated production chains with local brands capable of reaching both Jordanian and international markets.

That would turn agriculture into a much longer economic chain. Jobs would be created in processing, packaging, transport, marketing, storage, technology and exports. The economic activity would begin on the farm, but it would not end with the farmer.

Tourism can work in much the same way.

The objective is not to compete with Petra or Wadi Rum. Irbid needs to build a different tourism product, one based on the experience of northern Jordan: fields, villages, farms, rural food, archaeological sites, spring landscapes, olive harvests, agricultural seasons and natural viewpoints.

A small tourism business employing five young people may have greater social and local economic value than a large investment that creates relatively few jobs.

There is another factor that should not be ignored: Syria.

Irbid's northern location could become a significant economic advantage if trade relations continue to improve and a large-scale reconstruction process gets underway inside Syria.

The World Bank has estimated Syria's reconstruction needs at around $216 billion. The scale of that figure alone indicates the potential demand for construction materials, transport, food, logistics, energy, engineering and other services over the coming years.

Jordan-Syria trade reached close to $1 billion in 2025, according to figures cited by the Carnegie Endowment from Jordan's Department of Statistics.

That suggests that the economic relationship between the two countries has already begun to regain some of its previous weight. Northern Jordan could become even more important if cross-border trade and investment continue to expand.

Irbid does not have to wait for Syrian reconstruction to begin.

It can prepare now.

Warehouses and distribution centres, transport companies, logistics services, food-processing industries, construction firms, engineering services, specialised workshops and agricultural businesses could all position themselves to serve both the Jordanian and Syrian markets.

Geographic proximity only becomes an economic advantage when there is an investment ecosystem capable of using it.

The problem in Irbid is not a lack of resources. It is the absence of a clear model for turning those resources into opportunities.

The governorate has universities, a large pool of educated young people, fertile agricultural land, tourism sites, proximity to Syria, industrial areas, road networks and a large consumer market.

Yet much of the economy still revolves around traditional trade, services and public-sector employment. Some capital continues to move towards Amman, while some young people look outside the country for opportunities.

Irbid needs a different investment programme.

Certain areas could be designated for small tourism projects. Young entrepreneurs could be offered financing on favourable terms. Licensing procedures could be simplified. At the same time, fertile agricultural land should be protected from uncontrolled residential and commercial development.

The government, municipalities, private sector and universities could work together on an investment map for the governorate, identifying what each area can produce and what types of businesses are best suited to it.

Irbid faces a fairly straightforward economic choice in the coming years.

It can continue expanding over some of its most productive agricultural land while leaving young people to look for opportunities elsewhere in Jordan or abroad.

Or it can redefine its economy around modern agriculture, rural tourism, food processing, logistics and trade linked to Syria.

The opportunity is there, but the window will not remain open indefinitely.

Every agricultural dunum that becomes concrete today is difficult to recover tomorrow. Every young person who leaves because they cannot find an opportunity is also an economic loss, particularly when that person could have become a small-business owner, a modern farmer or a tourism entrepreneur.

The question, ultimately, is not simply how to stop the people of Irbid from leaving.

It is how to make staying in Irbid, working in Irbid and investing in Irbid a reasonable economic choice.