Half As Many Entrants Play US Green-Card Lottery

(NewsCore) - Only eight million people tried to win a green card in the latest US diversity-visa lottery, the State Department said Thursday, compared with a record 15 million last year.

That figure could slide further in coming years, because the Senate recently passed a measure to charge a fee for entering the electronic draw, starting with next year's drawing.

A State Department spokeswoman attributed the drop in entries this year to the fact that Bangladeshis -- for many years the most numerous applicants -- weren't eligible to participate. The South Asian nation is no longer classified as a low-immigration country to the US.

The diversity-visa lottery is an immigration program that offers a quick path to permanent US residence for 50,000 people each year who are selected randomly by the US government from countries that send few immigrants to the US.

Earlier this year, a computer glitch forced the government to redo the previous lottery, after 22,000 people were incorrectly notified that they had won.

During the month-long entry period every fall, the green-card lottery generates a frenzy in countries across Africa, the source of most entries now.

This year, the three countries that submitted the most entries were Nigeria, with 1.36 million; Ghana, with 909,000; and Ukraine, with 853,000. Last year, Bangladesh accounted for 7.6 million entries.

The results of this year's diversity-visa draw will be announced in May.

Read more: Wall Street Journal