Western public attitudes to immigration have not been greatly affected by the global economic downturn, an opinion poll published today showed.

Voters surveyed in the United States, Canada, Germany, Britain, France, Spain, Italy and the Netherlands all saw the economy as their country's most pressing issue, but immigration was the second biggest issue for Britons and Italians.

Roughly half those surveyed in the Transatlantic Trends: Immigration opinion poll, conducted by the U.S. think-tank German Marshall Fund with partners, saw immigration as more of a problem than an opportunity, only slightly up from last year.

"The economic crisis has not had a large effect on overall attitudes," the poll said.

Those whose economic situation had got worse in the last year were only slightly more worried about immigration. Far more pronounced was the increase in concern among those who described themselves as being politically right-of-centre.

One explanation for the apparent lack of increased concern could be that, according to a Washington-based think-tank, the economic downturn has also drastically slowed migration as Western countries become less attractive.

Opinions varied on what to do about immigration, the opinion poll said, with Germans and French for giving illegal immigrants the chance to obtain legal status and Italians and British against. Those from the other countries were evenly split.

There was also a wide variation in how voters viewed their government's immigration policies.

Most Americans, British, Spanish and Italians disapproved of their government's management of the issue, while most Germans, Canadians, Dutch and 50 percent of French people approved.

There are an estimated 214 million migrants in the world today, or 3 percent of the global population, according to the International Organization for Migration.

"Migration is one of the defining issues of the 21st century," the IOM said on its Web site. "It is now an essential, inevitable and potentially beneficial component of the economic and social life of every country and region."

Italy, facing a wave of illegal migrants across the Mediterranean from north Africa has launched a crackdown, while Britain has set up tougher controls at French ports. The United States has also tightened security along its border with Mexico.

Most people in the three Mediterranean countries surveyed -- France, Italy and Spain -- thought increasing aid to the developing world would be a better way of stemming illegal immigration than trying to enforce tougher border controls.

The poll was taken between Sept. 1-17 from about 1,000 people in each of the countries surveyed and has a margin of error of plus or minus three percentage points.