September records workers’ remittances inflows worth US$ 482mn

• January-September remittances at US$ 4.3bn, up 75%

Higher workers’ remittance inflows continue to cushion Sri Lanka’s balance of payments with September recording remittances inflows to the tune of US$ 482.4 million, up from US$ 359.3 million recorded for the same month last year.

However, the September figure was slightly below August’s US$ 499 million and the US$ 570 million remittances average for the month of September during the period from 2015 to 2020.

The cumulative workers’ remittances for the January-September 2023 period stood at US$ 4, 345.1 million, up 75.1 percent from the corresponding period last year.

The Central Bank expects Sri Lanka to record remittances inflows of about US$ 6 billion for this year. In 2022, workers’ remittances inflows to the country were recorded at US$ 3. 789.4 million and US$ 5, 491 in 2021. 
In 2020, workers’ remittances inflows to Sri Lanka hit a record of US$ 7.1 billion as the pandemic made the unofficial channels of sending money unavailable.

Since the pandemic, Sri Lankan authorities have cracked down on these unofficial channels and now the large majority of the remittances come to the country through the banking or the other official channels.
Relatively stable exchange rate and the absence of a significant difference between the exchange rates offered by formal and informal channels unlike earlier has also helped the situation.

Official data suggest that migrant workers from Sri Lanka since 2022 have increased significantly as a result of more people seeking foreign employment following the economic and political crisis that engulfed the country. The dollar-hungry government is also encouraging labour migration, though skilled migration, which is referred to as brain drain, and has created a whole lot of new issues in the country.