Bangladesh's remittance inflow dips to 10 bln USD

The inflow of remittance from some 10 million Bangladeshis living and working abroad fell by 17 percent year on year to some 10 billion U.S. dollars in the first three quarters of the 2016-17 fiscal year (July 2016-June 2017).

Concerned over the drop in remittance, Finance Minister AMA Muhith considers the downtrend as one of the major challenges for Bangladesh's economy, leading Bangladeshi private news agency bdnews24.com said Tuesday.

According to updated Bangladesh Bank data, the expatriates remitted 1.07 billion U.S. dollars in March, up from 940 million dollars in February, which was lowest in five years.

The remittance received in March this year, however, is 16.19 percent less than the 1.285 billion dollars received in the same month last year.

In July-March period, Bangladesh received 9.19 billion dollars. In the same period in 2015-16 fiscal year, the amount was 11.05 billion dollars.

Speaking to bdnews24.com, Finance Minister Muhith blamed the weakening economies of Mideast countries.

He said the salaries of the Bangladeshi workers in those countries dropped due to low world oil prices. "Many have even lost their jobs," he said.

Zaid Bakht, a research director of the Bangladesh Institute of Development Studies (BIDS), said the devaluation of U.S. dollar against other currencies is the reason why Bangladesh was getting less remittance.

The inflow of remittance was more than 1 billion dollars a month for the past few years but started to drop in November last year. Endit