MANILA, Jan. 14 (Xinhua) -- Personal remittances from overseas Filipinos grew slightly by 0.1 percent year-on-year to 2.643 billion U.S. dollars in November 2020 from 2.639 billion U.S. dollars in November 2019, the Philippine central bank said on Thursday.
The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) attributed the moderate growth to a 0.5-percent increase in remittances from land-based workers with work contracts of one year or more to 2.01 billion U.S. dollars from 2.001 billion U.S. dollars recorded in November 2019.
Meanwhile, the BSP said the remittances from sea-based workers and land-based workers with work contracts of less than one year fell slightly by 0.3 percent to 575 million U.S. dollars in November 2020 from 577 million U.S. dollars a year ago.
For the first 11 months of 2020, the BSP said personal remittances reached 29.988 billion U.S. dollars from the 30.252 billion U.S. dollars recorded a year ago, bringing the cumulative contraction to 0.9 percent in November from 1.0 percent in October 2020.
An estimated 12 million Filipinos are working abroad, according to the Philippine government data. These Filipino workers remit money to their families back in the Philippines.
The Asian Development Bank has projected the remittances from overseas Filipino workers, equivalent to 9 percent of the Philippines' gross domestic product, to slow down due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Enditem
