Tag: Pakistan remittances

  • Sixth consecutive month: Remittances remain over $2 billion

    Sixth consecutive month: Remittances remain over $2 billion

    Pakistan has maintained a strong momentum in workers’ remittance for the sixth consecutive month in November with over $2 billion, the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) has reported.

    Workers’ remittance increased 28.4% year-on-year in November 2020, pushing the cumulative flows to $11.8 billion during the July-November FY21 with a rise of 26.9% compared to same period last year.

    “This significant growth reflects continued government and SBP efforts to formalise remittances under Pakistan Remittances Initiative (PRI), growing use of digital channels amid limited international travel, orderly exchange market conditions and improved global economic activity,” said the central bank.

    The top four countries that contributed to the highest inflows are Saudi Arabia ($3.3 billion), United Arab Emirates ($2.4 billion), United Kingdom ($1.6 billion) and the United States ($1 billion).

  • Remittances rise to record single month high of $2.77 billion in Pakistan

    Remittances rise to record single month high of $2.77 billion in Pakistan

    Remittances rose to $2.77 billion in July, which is the highest ever level of remittances in a single month in Pakistan, according to data released by the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) on Monday.

    That represents a year-on-year growth of 36.5pc when compared with July 2019, and 12.2pc when compared to June 2020. Last month, remittances were recorded at $2.47 billion, which the SBP had dubbed as ‘historic’ at the time.

    Most of the remittances in July were received from Saudi Arabia, at $821.6 million; followed by UAE, at $538.2 million; UK, at $393.9 million; and the US, at $250.6 million.

    The central bank also noted that the growth rate in remittances compared to the same month in the previous year is around twice as high as the Eid-ul-Adha related seasonality typically experienced over the last decade.

    “Given the impact of COVID-19 globally, this increase in worker’s remittances is encouraging,” the SBP said.

    Overall, there are two main factors that explain the rise in remittances, along with some minor reasons.

    The first is that it seems the use of official channels to send remittances has increased, and there has been a decline in traditional hawala and hundi methods of sending cash home.

  • Pakistan’s IT exports surge to $1.2 billion in FY2019-20

    Pakistan’s Information Technology (IT) and IT-enabled Services (ITeS) export remittances have surged by 23.71% ($1.230 billion) in financial year (FY) 2019-2020.

    The numbers were revealed in a performance report released by the Pakistan Software Export Board (PSEB) on Friday.

    According to FY2018-2019, the remittances were $994.848 million and they have now increased to $1.230 billion in FY2019-2020

    Mr Syed Aminul Haq, Federal Minister for IT & Telecommunications (MOIT), said that they have targeted and is working towards increasing these export numbers up to $5 billion in the next three years.

    He further said that under the vision of Digital Pakistan, we should promote and support all IT-related projects and connect Pakistan to the digital world.

    The ministry’s spokesperson also mentioned that 6,000 Pakistan-based IT companies were providing IT products and services to people in over 100 countries.

    Pakistani IT companies have been providing products and services to some of the world’s largest companies. The country has been ranked as the third most popular country for freelancing in the world.

    “The Information and Communications Technology industry of our country has seen high achievements in the past few years. Pakistan is surely heading in the right direction in terms of achieving that $5 billion revenue goal for the industry by the year 2024,” said the spokesperson.