Remittances up by 8.45pc to $17.875b

ISLAMABAD: The Economic Survey 2018-19 presented here on Monday by Adviser to PM on Finance, Revenue and Economic Affairs Dr Hafeez Shaikh unfolds that the remittances have increased by 8.45 percent in first 10 months of the ongoing fiscal to $17.875 billion against $16.482 billion during the same period last year.

It further reveals that the major share of remittances are from Saudi Arabia which is 23.36 percent ($4.175 billion), UAE 21.19 percent ($3.787 billion), USA 15.6 percent ($2.786 billion), UK 15.41 ($2.756 billion), other GCC countries 9.61 percent ($1.718 billion), Malaysia 7.06 percent ($1.263 billion ), EU 2.72 percent ($485.89 million) and other countries 5.07 percent.

The remittances during July-April financial year 2019 have declined by 9.28 percent from EU countries, 5.40 percent from other GCC countries. However, a marginal increase in remittances has been observed from Saudi Arabia, 2.08 percent as compared to 9.5 percent decline in the same periods last year. However, visa fee reduction from the Kingdom is likely to boost up the inflows in coming years. A strong increase from USA and UK provided a major push to inflows.

Remittances increased by 21.82 percent form USA and 16.59 percent from UK. Economic turnaround, declining unemployment and rising wages in the US and the UK in the recent past have supported inflows from these countries. Besides the US and the UK, inflows from Malaysia also supported overall remittances, with inflows amounting to $1.262 billion in July-April FY2019.

Over the last couple of years, Malaysia has been facing workforce shortage in labour-intensive sectors, such as manufacturing, construction and agriculture. To address the problem, Malaysia raised the wages for both local and foreign workers in its minimum wage policy of 2013. Following this, the number of Pakistanis going to Malaysia for work has been rising since 2014-15, leading to increase in remittances from the country.