Remittance inflows lowest in four months

Staff Reporter :
Remittance income of the country gets lowest in the past four months, according to the latest data from the Bangladesh Bank.
Bangladesh Bank data showed that the country received 1561 million USD in February which was dropped by 20.3 per cent compared to the previous month.
The country earned 1958 million USD remittances in January this year.
Besides, the remittance earning on November was 1595 mln USD, in December it was 1699 mln USD.
The data showed that the remittance earning in February was lowest among the last four months.
When contacted, Bangladesh Bank spokesperson Md Mezbaul Haque told The New Nation, “Hundi circles are responsible for decreasing remittanes from the Middle Eastern countries. They (Hundi circle) used to dodge migrant workers with fake Nagad and Bkash apps using for Mobile Financial Services (MFS). The central bank has authorised the legal MFS providers to operate their business with our wage earners abroad.”
After starting the operations of MFS, the audacity of Hundi circles will be controlled and remittance inflow will be increased automatically.
He, however, said that the increasing of incentive and actions of law enforcers’ against illegal channels of hundi circles will also be helpful for hiking the remittances.
The central bank spokesperson said, the remittance inflow does not remain the same every month. The flow has decreased slightly compared to January.
He said, that it is expected that the remittance inflow will increase a lot during Ramzan and the two Eid times.
Meanwhile, experts point out that the remittance inflow is not increasing in proportion to the amount of manpower exported after the easing of Covid-19 pandemic.
They said that money laundering and high immigration costs are the key reasons behind reduction of remittances.
The data from the Bureau of Manpower, Employment and Training (BMET) showed that the country sent 6.17 lakh workers abroad in 2021.
Besides, it sends 11.35 lakh wage-earner in 2022, which is a record high for the country.