"Growth of remittances in 2011 exceeded our earlier expectations in four regions, especially in Europe and central Asia... and sub-Saharan Africa," write lead economists at the World Bank's Migration and Remittances Unit in a brief released on 1 December.
The top recipient countries were India, China, Mexico and the Philippines, but smaller nations such as Tajikistan, Lesotho, Nepal and Lebanon received a greater flow of remittances as a percentage of their gross domestic product (GDP) - Lesotho, for example, relied on remittances for 29 percent of its GDP in 2011.
Money sent home by migrants now represents three times the amount of official development aid to countries receiving assistance and is crucial to alleviating poverty, according to the World Bank.
But the news is not all good. The ongoing debt crisis in Europe and high unemployment in many developed countries "is affecting employment prospects of existing migrants and hardening political attitudes toward new immigration", the World Bank economists note. Saudi Arabia recently introduced an indigenization programme that limits the number of foreign workers companies can hire and the United Kingdom has imposed tougher admission criteria for non-EU migrants.
ks/he
This article was produced by IRIN News while it was part of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. Please send queries on copyright or liability to the UN. For more information: https://shop.un.org/rights-permissions