F.P. Report
ISLAMABAD: The overseas Pakistani workers’ remittances continued strong trend and remained above $ 2 billion mark for 16th consecutive month as the remittances recorded $2.7 billion in September 2021.
In terms of growth, the remittances increased by 0.5% over previous month and soared by 16.9% over the same month last year, according to data released by State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) on Friday.
Cumulatively, remittances reached to $8.0 billion in first quarter of Fiscal Year 2021-22, a significant growth of 12.5% over the same period last year.
The historic increase in the inflows has helped improving the country’s external sector position despite the challenging global economic conditions in the past year.
Remittance inflows during September 2021 were mainly sourced from Saudi Arabia ($691million), UAE ($502 million), United Kingdom ($370 million) and the US ($245 million).
During the corresponding month, the overseas Pakistanis living in Bahrain sent $42.9 million, from Kuwait $79.8 million, from Qatar $79.7 million whereas $95.2 million were dispatched from Oman.
Similarly the inflows from Germany, France, The Netherlands, Spain, Italy, Greece, Sweden, Denmark, and Ireland were recorded at $45.1 million, $44.5 million, $4.5 million, $45 million, $77.4 million, $32.1 million, $6.4 million, $6.1 million and $13.2 million respectively.
Likewise, from Malaysia, Norway, Switzerland, Australia, Canada, and Japan, the workers dispatched $11.6 million, $13.2 million, $3.3 million, $71.8 million, $53.7 million, and $6.6 million respectively.
“Proactive policy measures by the Government and SBP to incentivize the use of formal channels, curtailed cross-border travel in the face of COVID-19, altruistic transfers to Pakistan amid the pandemic, and orderly foreign exchange market conditions have positively contributed towards the sustained improvement in remittance inflows since last year”, the statement added.
