by FFE PH News Staff

Philippine central bank reports amount of November remittances jumped 6.1%.

The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) yesterday announced that cash remittances through banks increased by 6.1% year-on-year as of November 2013. This places the total amount of remittances through banks to $20.605b. Personal remittances sent by overseas Filipino workers (OFW) meanwhile jumped by 7.1% year-on-year to end with $22.738b.

Cash remittances through banks are easily monitored by the central bank while personal remittances are those transmitted through personal transfers or transfers between households. The major sources of these remittances are America, Saudi Arabia, Britain, the United Arab Emirates, Canada and Japan.

Cash transfers from land-based workers were up by 5.5% to $15.8b while sea-based remittances increased by 8.2% to $4.8b. Central bank governor Amando Tetangco Junior said that personal remittances for November ‘marks the eighth consecutive month in 2013 that personal remittances breached the $2b mark.’

BSP added ‘Other household-to-household transfers comprising largely of cash transfers from Filipinos who have migrated abroad also rose significantly.’

Remittances continued to show signs of strength despite ongoing economic recoveries in countries that are major sources of OFW remittances like America and Europe. BSP explained that ‘The steady deployment of OF workers remained the key driver of growth in remittance flows for the first eleven months of the year.’ According to the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA), 731,254 job orders were approved from January to November last year.

BSP said that around 43.2% of the said job orders were ‘intended for the manpower requirements of Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Qatar.’