Staff Reporter
Karachi
State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) on Monday said that the workers’ remittances rose by a significant 50.7 percent during June 2020 to reach record high $2.46 billion compared with $1.63 billion in June 2019. Similarly, on a cumulative basis, workers’ remittances increased to a historic high level of $23.12 billion during FY20, witnessing a growth of 6.4 percent over $21.74 billion during FY19. The significant increase in remittances during June 2020 can be attributed to a number of factors. Since many of the countries eased lockdown in June, overseas Pakistanis were able to transfer accumulative funds, which they were unable to send earlier. Further, it is also believed that they sent remittances to support extended families and friends due to COVID-19. In addition to these, efforts by the Government and SBP also played their role in the increased inflow of workers’ remittances during FY20 in general and Covid-19 period, March till June 2020, in particular.
Supportive government policies in terms of extension of Reimbursement of TT Charges Scheme (Free Send Remittance Scheme) to small remitters by reducing threshold from USD 200 to USD 100, as well as, broadening the scope of incentive scheme for marketing scheme for financial institutions increased the incentives for sending remittances through regular channels.
