Country eyes $10 billion remittance next fiscal
Naim-Ul-Karim | Monday, 16 June 2008
The receipts from overseas remittances is expected to reach US$10 billion in the next fiscal year following a robust growth in manpower export in the outgoing fiscal, a senior official said Saturday.
In the first 11 months of the outgoing fiscal, inflow of remittances from around 5.6 million Bangladeshis, living and working abroad, stood at $7.163 billion with 31.14 per cent growth over the same period of the last fiscal.
"We will have no other alternative but to encourage increased remittances from abroad in next fiscal year to meet the country's surging import payments," a senior central bank official said, requesting to be unnamed.
In July-May period of the current fiscal, import payments soared by 25 per cent stood at $18.22 billion against $14.65 billion in the same period of the last fiscal.
On the other hand, the country's exports in the first ten months of the current fiscal with 14.66 per cent growth stood at $11.65 billion.
In the last fiscal, the country's foreign trade accounted for $29.63 billion including $12.18 billion in export and $17.45 billion in import bills.
A senior official of the Bureau of Manpower, Employment and Training, requesting for anonymity, said it would not be a difficult task if the government offers more facilities to the expatriates to remit money through formal channels.
Apart from this, he said: "A business-friendly environment has to be created in the country's real-estate sector so that realtors can woo more expatriates to buy flats and plots at home which can contribute immensely in boosting inflow of remittances."
Chief of the Ministry of Expatriates' Welfare and Overseas Employment (MEWOE) said the government has already taken a number of measures to make transfer of remittances to the families of expatriates safely and quickly.
"I don't think $10 billion worth of remittances in next fiscal will be an impossible task as we are now exporting more skilled manpower," Abdul Matin Chowdhury, secretary of the MEWOE, told the FE Saturday.
There is an instruction for arranging motivational courses for overseas job aspirants prior to leaving Dhaka to send home money through formal channels, he said.
"We have already allowed the private commercial banks to partner with government and non-government organisations having network deep into the country side to boost remittances," the official said, adding there is a strong possibility to boost remittances as manpower export is recording an impressive double digit growth this year.
More than 377,894 Bangladeshis found jobs in over 100 countries during the January-May period or 42.16 up over that in the same period of the last year, according to the Bureau of Manpower, Employment and Training (BMET) statistics.
In the first 11 months of the outgoing fiscal, inflow of remittances from around 5.6 million Bangladeshis, living and working abroad, stood at $7.163 billion with 31.14 per cent growth over the same period of the last fiscal.
"We will have no other alternative but to encourage increased remittances from abroad in next fiscal year to meet the country's surging import payments," a senior central bank official said, requesting to be unnamed.
In July-May period of the current fiscal, import payments soared by 25 per cent stood at $18.22 billion against $14.65 billion in the same period of the last fiscal.
On the other hand, the country's exports in the first ten months of the current fiscal with 14.66 per cent growth stood at $11.65 billion.
In the last fiscal, the country's foreign trade accounted for $29.63 billion including $12.18 billion in export and $17.45 billion in import bills.
A senior official of the Bureau of Manpower, Employment and Training, requesting for anonymity, said it would not be a difficult task if the government offers more facilities to the expatriates to remit money through formal channels.
Apart from this, he said: "A business-friendly environment has to be created in the country's real-estate sector so that realtors can woo more expatriates to buy flats and plots at home which can contribute immensely in boosting inflow of remittances."
Chief of the Ministry of Expatriates' Welfare and Overseas Employment (MEWOE) said the government has already taken a number of measures to make transfer of remittances to the families of expatriates safely and quickly.
"I don't think $10 billion worth of remittances in next fiscal will be an impossible task as we are now exporting more skilled manpower," Abdul Matin Chowdhury, secretary of the MEWOE, told the FE Saturday.
There is an instruction for arranging motivational courses for overseas job aspirants prior to leaving Dhaka to send home money through formal channels, he said.
"We have already allowed the private commercial banks to partner with government and non-government organisations having network deep into the country side to boost remittances," the official said, adding there is a strong possibility to boost remittances as manpower export is recording an impressive double digit growth this year.
More than 377,894 Bangladeshis found jobs in over 100 countries during the January-May period or 42.16 up over that in the same period of the last year, according to the Bureau of Manpower, Employment and Training (BMET) statistics.