KARACHI: Inflows of workers’ remittances fell by 8 percent during the first month of this fiscal year (FY23), the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) reported on Tuesday.
Workers’ remittances recorded an inflow of $2.5 billion during July 22, continuing their record streak of above $2 billion mark for the 26 consecutive months.
However, in terms of growth, workers’ remittances decreased by 8 percent in July 2022 compared to July 2021, in which home remittances inflows amounted to $2.76 billion.
Inflows of remittances in July 2021 are also less than June 2022, which fetched workers’ remittances worth $2.736 billion.
According to SBP, despite some decline, the $2.5 billion home remittances inflows are remained strong in July 2022. This decline was due to considerably fewer working days because of Eid holidays. While, the daily average rate of remittances was 18 percent higher in July 2022 than in June 2022.
“The decrease largely reflected the lower number of working days in July as a result of Eid, at 17 working days compared to 22 in June and 18 in July 2021,” it added.
Remittances: Pakistan receives record inflow of $31.2bn in FY22
Remittance inflows during July 2022 were mainly sourced from Saudi Arabia worth $580.6 million, United Arab Emirates $456.2 million, United Kingdom $411.7 million and United States of America $254.3 million.
The government is already making efforts to increase the foreign inflows of home remittances and exports to meet the external debt obligations and build the sliding foreign exchange reserves of the country.
Pakistan is facing a serious cash crisis due to massive external debt servicing and rising current account deficit.
The country’s foreign exchange reserves declined sharply $2 billion in the first five weeks of this fiscal year (FY23).
Copyright Business Recorder, 2022
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