July 15, 2013
8:21 pm [ manilatimes.net ]
by MAYVELIN
U. CARABALLO
Personal
remittances from overseas Filipino workers (OFW) breached the $2-billion mark
in May 2013, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) announced on Monday.
OFW
remittances rose to $2.1 billion, or a 6.2 percent year-on-year increment. It
brought the cumulative remittances for the first five months of the year to
$9.7 billion.
The January
to May figure was higher by 6.4 percent than the level registered in the same
period last year.
The BSP said
that the steady increase in personal remittances during the five-month period
was driven largely by remittance flows from by land-based overseas Filipino
workers (OFWs) with work contracts of one year or more. Remittances of OFWs
with long-term contracts reached $7.2 billion
Meanwhile,
remittances from sea-based workers and land-based workers with short-term
contracts reached $2.3 billion.
“The
remaining $0.2 billion [$200 million] of total personal remittances for the
first five months of the year consisted of transfers from Filipinos who have
migrated abroad,” it stated.
The central
bank added that cash remittances from overseas Filipinos coursed through banks
for the first five months of 2013 also went up by 5.6 percent to reach $8.8
billion.
Remittances
from both sea-based and land-based workers recorded an increase of 9.2 percent
and 4.5 percent, respectively.
United
States, Saudi Arabia, Canada, the United Kingdom, the United Arab Emirates,
Singapore, Canada and Japan were the top sources of remittances.
“Remittances
remained robust due to sustained strong demand for skilled Filipino manpower
overseas,” the BSP said.
It added that
latest data from the Philippine Overseas Employments Administration showed that
one-third of the 431,394 approved job orders in January to June 2013 were
already processed.
These
processed job orders for services, production, and professional, technical and
related workers were mainly intended for the manpower requirements of Saudi
Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Hong Kong, and Qatar.
“Meanwhile,
efforts of bank and non-bank remittance service providers to expand their
international and domestic market coverage have also supported the inflow of
remittances,” it said.
___________________________________________________________
