Therise in remittances was supported by steady overseas demands forskilled Filipino labourers, the central bank of the Philippines (BSP)said, adding that the expansion of banks and non-banks’ remittanceservices has made contributions to the surge of remittances fromoverseas workers.
However, the growth showed a plunge compared to the 11.3 percent rise in March.
Inthe four months to April, cash transfers stood at 7.807 billion USD,rising 5.4 percent from the same period last year. Of the total cashremittances, 5.9 billion USD was sent by land-based workers while theremaining was transferred by sea-based workers.
The BSP said thatthe funds were mainly sent from the US, Saudi Arabia, the UnitedArab Emirates (UAE), the UK, Singapore, Japan, Canada and HongKong (China ).
According to statistics from thePhilippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA), there were 310,727Filipinos working in foreign countries, nearly 40 percent of themworked in service, production and technical sectors in Saudi Arabia,the UAE, Kuwait, Taiwan (China) and Qatar.
Last year, the country saw a record nearly 24.35 billion USD ofremittances, up 5.8 percent from previous year and accounting for 8.5percent of the nation’s gross domestic products (GDP).
The BSP forecast that cash remittances will swell by 5 percent over 2014’s level to reach 25.6 billion USD this year.-VNA