|
WASHINGTON, Oct 25 (AFP): Migrant workers are expected to send home a whopping US$225 billion this year, the World Bank said Monday, as a new study showed remittances playing a key role in slashing poverty rates in developing economies.
Worker remittances also increase spending in home countries on education, health and investment, the bank said.
"Close to 200 million people are living in countries other than the ones in which they were born, and remittances are estimated to reach about $225 billion in 2005," the Washington-based bank said, quoting from its forthcoming publication, Global Economic Prospects 2006.
"This makes remittances the biggest source of foreign exchange in many countries and has major implications for strategies to reduce poverty in developing nations," it said.
The report, to be released in November, will examine policy options to increase the poverty-reducing impact of international migration and remittances.
The World Bank presented the findings in conjunction with the release on Monday of a new study -- International Migration, Remittances and the Brain Drain -- produced by its research department.
It includes a detailed analysis of household survey data in Mexico, Guatemala and the Philippines-all countries that produce millions of migrants-which concludes that families whose members include migrants living abroad have higher incomes than those with no migrants.
|