January’s amount highest in last seven months
Staff Correspondent
The inflow of remittance to the country is increasing despite the fear that the global economic recession will reduce it drastically, said Bangladesh Bank officials.
The country received $860 million as remittance in January, according to a provisional estimate by the BB. The amount is the highest in the last seven months and is up by almost 22 per cent over remittance in the same month of the previous year, said a senior BB official.
In January 2008, $710 million was sent by some 5.5 million Bangladeshi expatriates as remittance, mainly from the Middle East countries.
Economists and trade experts have been apprehending for the last several months that the falling prices of fuel oils due to lack of demand in the wake of the worst economic meltdown after World War II will hit hard the economies of the oil-rich Arab countries.
As a result, the inflow of remittance from the Arab region, accounting for nearly 80 per cent of the total remittance, will drop drastically.
However, there is no sign of diminution yet as the inflow of remittance has maintained its robust growth of 30 per cent in the first seven-month of this fiscal year (July ‘08-June ‘09).
Trade expert Mustafizur Rahman, also the executive director of the Centre for Policy Dialogue, told New Age that the growth in remittance will not slow down as greatly as apprehended earlier.
‘It may slow down a bit in the near future as fewer people have been getting overseas jobs in the last couple of months,’ he said.
Some 1.5 million Bangladeshis sought overseas jobs in 2007 and 2008. But the growth in manpower export slowed down in the last quarter of 2008.
About 6.2 million Bangladeshis are still working in different parts of the world and they are mainly engaged in the lower-end jobs, said Rahman.
‘The inflow of remittance will maintain its impressive growth unless these expatriate Bangladeshis lose their jobs on a massive scale,’ he said.
The expatriate Bangladeshis are ‘unsung heroes’ as they are sending valuable foreign currencies to bolster the country’s foreign exchange reserve, said BB governor Saleh Uddin.
The country received nearly $9 billion as remittance in 2008, higher by 31 per cent over 2007.
Courtesy: newagebd.com
