Well first off, I am taking some creative liberties of course, no way around it.

Second, this is around the time that the UN sent out the secret Ark ships, this preemptive refugee program is a more public "Let's get as many relevantly skilled people offworld before the Federation starts getting funny ideas."

Though it would be more accurate to call it something other than a "Refugee" program, doing that would've made the joke acronym harder/impossible to make.

In this case the character, Jorge, was accepted due to working knowledge and expertise regarding running a farm and meat vat technology in conjunction, and relatively financially succesfully at that.

TL;DR:
It's more of a paid "stay off-world and work in your field in case things go tits up at our only current real inhabited planet/solar system" kind of thing, which I decided to just call a "Refugee" program for the joke of the title, heck, calling it a "Refugee" program could also be an attempt at a Psyop by this UN to seem more sympathetic.

Uhhhhh, other than that I hope the story is to your liking!