KARACHI: A report released by the World Bank projected Pakistan’sremittances with 6.2% growth will remain $20.9 billion in 2018.
The country was ranked 7th among the top ten recipients of remittancesglobally with India ranked at 1st with $79.5 billion.
In South Asia, Pakistan was ranked 2nd behind India, the report said.
The World Bank report said that the employment opportunities havecontracted in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries in 2017 and2018, mostly in Saudi Arabia because of nationalization policies, ashighlighted by lower deployments in Pakistan.
The WB report said that South Asia had the lowest average remittance costsin any world region at 5.4% in the 3rd quarter of 2018.
The Washington-based lender, however, indicated this was a touch higherthan the 5.2% percent costs recorded in the previous quarter and a reversalof the steady declines seen since the second quarter of 2017.
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The report further said the number of workers registered for overseasemployment in Pakistan, dropped by 41% (0.83 million in 2016 to 0.5 millionin 2017).
The remittances to South Asia are forecast to grow by 13.5% to $132 billionin 2018, a healthier rise than the 5.7% recorded in 2017.
The upsurge is pushed by stronger economic upsurge in advanced economies,especially the United States and the rise in oil prices having a positiveimpact on outflows from some GCC countries, such as the United ArabEmirates which reported a 13% growth in outflows for the first half of 2018.
World Bank projects that officially recorded remittances to developingcountries would grow by 10.8% to $258 billion in 2018.
