Bangladesh may get $15 billion in remittance in 2013

Bangladesh has been ranked seventh on the list of ten countries expected to receive highest officially recorded remittance this year.

The World Bank’s “Migration and Development Brief” on global migration and remittances stated Bangladeshi expatriates are expected to remit $15 billion in 2013, followed by Pakistan.

An overview of the brief was published on the WB’s website on Oct 2, projecting the developing world would receive $414 billion in migrant remittances in 2013, a 6.3 percent increase over the previous year. The amount is projected to rise to $540 billion by 2016.

The bank listed Bangladesh among the four countries whose remittances are larger than the national foreign exchange reserve.

Remittances to Bangladesh were moderately higher in the first seven months of 2013 than previous year, and growth is expected to accelerate during the rest of the year.

The World Bank brief said all these four countries “have instituted various incentives for attracting remittances.” “In South Asia, remittances are noticeably supporting the balance of payments.”

Remittances are larger than the earnings from IT exports in India, which tops the list of top remittance recipient countries, followed by China. These two Asian countries are expected to receive $ 131 billion, which is nearly a third of the total remittances sent to the developing world.

“Growth of remittances has been robust in all regions of the world, except for Latin America and the Caribbean, where growth decelerated due to economic weakness in the United States,” said the WB brief.

The direction of remittances in the Middle East and North Africa is unclear as conflicts have assumed critical proportions on that part of the world.

According to the brief, costly official channels compel people seek out informal channels as their preferred means for sending money home which is an obstacle to the utilization of remittances for development purposes.

“The global average cost for sending remittances is 9 percent, broadly unchanged from 2012.”

People are facing difficulties in sending money home over money laundering and terrorism financing concerns. Including the high-income countries, the global remittance inflows in 2013 are expected to be $550 billion.

By GDP percentage, the top recipients of remittances, in 2012, were Tajikistan (48 percent), Kyrgyz Republic (31 percent), Lesotho and Nepal (25 percent each), and Moldova (24 percent).

“Flows are expected to remain strong or even increase in several countries affected by weakening balance of payments, notably India, the top recipient of remittances in the world.”