Bangladesh’s remittance earnings up 29% in 7 months

Dhaka, Bangladesh | July 02, 2007 by D-8 Secretariat

Bangladeshi expatriates sent home a record 3.32 billion U.S. dollars in the first seven months of the current fiscal year, marking a 29 percent growth over the same period of the last fiscal year, according to the central bank, the Bangladesh Bank.

According to the provisional estimates of the central bank, the country received 3.32 billion dollars in remittance during the July-January period of fiscal 2006-07 year (July 2006-June 2007) against 2.57 billion dollars in the same period of the previous fiscal year, local daily The Financial Express reported Tuesday.

The remittance earnings in the period came as a continuation of last fiscal's trend and record inflow of 4.81 billion dollars. The growth in fiscal 2005-06 (July 2005-June 2006) was 24.89 percent over the previous fiscal. The country's foreign exchange reserve stood at 3.76 billion dollars on Monday due to the robust growth of remittances from Bangladeshis working abroad.

Last December, the total amount of foreign exchange remitted by Bangladeshi wage earners amounted to 555 million dollars, which was 138 million dollars higher than that of the corresponding month of the previous fiscal. A senior official of the Bangladesh Bank said the central bank is continuously pursuing the banks for taking necessary measures to boost the flow of inward remittances.

"With all this potential in mind, we want to put more focus on this D-8 migrant worker issue considering that the remittance sent home plays a quite significant role in cutting down poverty lines in our member states," says D-8 Secretary General in its headquarter in Istanbul, on Saturday. He added that the remittance are allocated for food, education, health, housing, as well as for developing micro industry or small & middle enterprises.

Secretary General is taking a concentrated initiative to set up a D-8 working group on this issue to help member countries to better route this potential remittance for the development of the D-8 member countries.

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