KARACHI: The inflows of workers’ remittances hit a historic high of $29.4 billion in the fiscal year 2020/21, the central bank reported on Tuesday.

“The remittances rose to a historic annual high of $29.4 billion,” the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) said, adding that this has helped improve the country’s external sector position, despite the challenging global economic conditions in the previous year.

The remittances registered a substantial 27 per cent growth in 2020/21 over the preceding year, the fastest rate of expansion since 2002/03.

The SBP also said with the inflows of around $2.7 billion in June 2021 (9 per cent growth (YoY) and 8 per cent growth (MoM), the workers’ remittances continued their unprecedented streak of above $2 billion for a record 13th consecutive month.

Seasonal pre-Eid-related inflows helped further boost the remittances level during June. The remittance inflows during FY21 were mainly sourced from Saudi Arabia ($7.7 billion), the United Arab Emirates ($6.1 billion), the United Kingdom ($4.1 billion) and the United States ($2.7 billion).

Overall, the record high inflows of workers’ remittances during 2020/21 have been driven by proactive policy measures by the government and the State Bank to incentivise the use of formal channels, curtailed cross-border travel in the face of the Covid-19 infections, altruistic transfers to Pakistan, amid the pandemic, and orderly foreign exchange market conditions.

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