Sometimes, he said, he sends money more than once a month.
Guco, like other migrant workers, says whatever he earns “is not enough.”
For remittance-receiving countries like the Bangladesh, Mexico and Sri Lanka, they were
enough.
Country ow
MAJOR remittance-receiving countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America got more of those
green bucks last year than in 2019. However, it was a trend the Philippines didn’t enjoy.
Increased remittances by Mexico, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, El Salvador, Dominican Republic and
Kenya got a push from their currencies, which depreciated versus the US dollar last year and
from migrants wiring more incomes for loved ones living in quarantined areas.
What these countries’ remittance levels reached negated country-level and regional-level
projections from multilateral organizations in April last year that the economic and health
impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic will pull down remittance in ows.
Full-year 2020 data from various central or federal reserve banks showed that year-on-year
remittance in ows were higher by 11.44 percent in Mexico (an additional $4.16 billion); 17.37
percent in Pakistan (+$3.84 billion); 5.77 percent in Sri Lanka (+$387.32 million); 4.77 percent
in El Salvador (+$269.65 million); 3.67 percent in the Dominican Republic (+$259.9 million);
and, 10.64 percent in Nigeria (+$297.67 million).
Bangladesh got some $3.409 billion more last year than in 2019, for an 18.6-percent increase.
Comparative data
THE Philippines, Nigeria and the Kyrgyz Republic received lesser remittance in ows in 2020 at
$230.05 million, $13.65 billion and $126.75 million, respectively.
According to end-2019 data from the World Bank, Mexico (third), the Philippines (fourth),
Nigeria (seventh), Pakistan (eighth) and Bangladesh (ninth) landed in the world’s top 10
remittance-receiving countries. Meanwhile, in terms of the share of remittances to gross
domestic product (GDP), the Kyrgyz Republic is fourth (36 percent) and El Salvador eighth (26
percent) worldwide even if their actual dollar amounts are smaller.
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Remittance totals for Mexico ($40.606 billion), Pakistan ($25.967 billion) and Bangladesh
($21.741 billion) in 2020 were even historic highs for these countries. The Philippines, for its