Feb. remittances up 5.8% to $1.587B

Money transfers by overseas Filipinos grew by 5.8 percent to $1.587 billion in February from $1.5 billion a year earlier, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) reported Monday.   February’s remittances were up 5.4 percent month-on-month.   “The continued inflow of overseas Filipinos’ remittances is supported by the sustained demand for Filipino manpower in various foreign labor markets,” BSP Gov. Amando Tetangco Jr. said in a statement.   Around $1.2 billion or 76.1 percent of the cash transfers in February were from land-based Filipino workers and $400 million or 23.9 percent were from sea-based workers, according to the Bangko Sentral chief.   He added that about 86.3 percent of the total fund transfers in March came from the US, Canada, Saudi Arabia, Japan, United Kingdom, Singapore, United Arab Emirates, Italy, Germany, and Hong Kong.   For the first two months of the year, Tetangco said year-on-year remittances expanded by 5.6 percent to $3.144 billion from $2.977 billion.   Tetangco noted the lifting of the deployment ban in Nigeria, Libya and South Sudan gives Filipinos more employment opportunities abroad.   Helping grow remittances were the strategic network of bank and non-bank service providers across the globe and the new financial products and money transfer services offered in the remittance market, according to the BSP.   “Moreover, local banks and other financial institutions continued to expand their presence abroad to serve the remittance needs of Filipino workers,” Tetangco said.   Philippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA) data showed that total job orders processed for professional and technical, service, and production workers rose 24.6 percent to 200,010 in the first quarter of the year.   These were intended for Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Taiwan, Kuwait, Singapore, and Hong Kong.   Remittances would likely slow down to 5 percent this year, after growing by 7.2 percent to a record high $20.117 billion last year–from $18.763 billion in 2010, according to the BSP. The revised target for remittances last year was 7 percent. —VS, GMA News