Workers’ remittances in February stood at around $2.2 billion, showing a growth of two percent month-on-month.
The remittance from the overseas Pakistanis is a big source of raising and maintaining the foreign exchange reserves in the country. Since the time, the present PTI government took over, it has been claiming that the Pakistani workforce, performing its services abroad has big trust in this government and will continue to increase the level of foreign remittances. During the last month, the inflows came to $2.2 billion, reflecting a 2 percent increase month-on-month basis.
There has been a 7.6 percent increase in the flow of remittances during the period from July to February in the current fiscal year. If the amount of inflow this February is compared with the number of inflows in February last year, a decrease of 2.7 percent has been witnessed.
Read more: Remittances exceed $2 billion for 20th consecutive month
Total $20.14 billion have been received from the overseas Pakistanis during the first eight months of the ongoing financial year as compared to $18.7 billion, received during these months in the previous fiscal year, indicating an increase of 7.6 percent.
It has been estimated that the foreign remittances, worth $30 billion will be received from the Pakistanis, working abroad during the fiscal year 2021-22. But due to the recent Russia-Ukraine war, the commodities’ pieces in general and the price of oil, in particular, have gone very high. The situation is alarming for the countries like Pakistan which usually faces a shortage of foreign exchange reserves.
The amount of $30 billion, as estimated to be received as foreign remittances, may not be sufficient for the ongoing fiscal year. As far as the condition of remittances from the different countries is concerned, Pakistan received $5.132 billion from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia during the first eight months of the current fiscal year. $3.768 billion have been received from the United Arab Emirates during the period from July to February in the ongoing fiscal year.
$2.322 billion were received from other GCC countries during the period, under review. From the United Kingdom, $2.786 billion have been received during the first eight months of the current fiscal year. The number of remittances from the United States of America during the period, under consideration, came to $1,911 billion.
The inflows from European Union came to $2.224 billion in the first eight months of the ongoing financial year. The remittances from Australia came to $492 million and the remittances from Canada stood at $440 million during the period from July to February in the current fiscal year.
