India is Largest Recipient of Foreign Remittances: World Bank Report

The World Bank report entitled Migration and Remittance Flows: Recent Trends and Outlook-2013-16 released on 2 October 2013 revealed that India emerged as the largest recipient of foreign remittances among developing economies in 2013.

In 2013 Non-Resident Indians (NRI) sent a record 71 billion Dollars home compared to 70 billion dollars in 2012. According to a Word Bank report NRIs are estimated to remit up to 85 billion dollars a year by 2015.

World Bank in its report stated India and China will represent nearly a third of total remittances to the developing world in 2013.

The surge in remittances continues despite the recent decline in Rupees against the Dollar. The gulf countries account for nearly 40 per cent of remittances in India while it was 48 percent to South Asian countries.

Report Highlights

1.The developing world is expected to receive 414 billion Dollars in migrant remittances in 2013, an increase of 6.3 percent over the previous year (2012). This is projected to rise to 540 billion Dollars by 2016.

2.Globally, the world’s 232 million international migrants are expected to remit earnings worth 550 billion Dollars in 2013 and over 700 billion Dollars by 2016.

3.The top recipients of officially recorded remittances for 2013 are India (with an estimated 71 billion Dollars), China (60 billion Dollars), the Philippines (26 billion Dollars), Mexico (22 billion Dollars), Nigeria (21 billion Dollars), and Egypt (20 billion Dollars). Other large recipients include Pakistan, Bangladesh, Vietnam, and Ukraine.

4.As a percentage of GDP, the top recipients of remittances, in 2012, were Tajikistan (48 percent), Kyrgyz Republic (31 percent), Lesotho and Nepal (25 percent each), and Moldova (24 percent).

5.Growth of remittances has been robust in all regions of the world, except for Latin America and the Caribbean, where growth decelerated due to economic weakness in the United States.

In India, remittances are larger than the earnings from IT exports. With the weakening of the Indian rupee, a surge in remittances is expected as nonresident Indians take advantage of the cheaper goods, services and assets back home. Remittances to India are expected to reach 71 billion Dollars in 2013.

Remittance is the act of transmitting money to a distant location to fulfill an obligation. International remittances are transfers of funds by foreign workers—remitters—who are living and working in other countries typically to their families who are still living in their home countries.