Remittances last year to Bangladesh reached $5bn.
India received remittances last year that were almost three times as large as the inward investments made by foreign firms.
India and China were the biggest beneficiaries of remittances last year, each receiving more than $60bn, followed by the Philippines ($24bn), Mexico ($24bn), and Nigeria ($21bn).
But while migration has brought economic gains — migrants sent home nearly $10.3 billion in remittances last year — it has also exacted a heavy toll on the country left behind.
Cuban emigrants sent back about $1 billion in remittances last year, studies show, with an increasing proportion of that money financing budding capitalists in need of pizza ovens or other equipment to work privately.
"The most remarkable thing about remittances today is their continued growth, year after year, despite the global economic crisis," says Dilip Ratha, head of migration and remittances at the World Bank.One reason for this apparent boom is simply that the data are better.
Remittances (2000) measures the proportion of households in a given municipality that received remittances from abroad in the year 2000.
Livestock rearing continues to be the most important economic activity in the region to this day, however a greater diversity of income sources now contributes to family incomes, including remittances (GRDR 2011).
Once the migrant has been away for 10 years, remittances fall and at an increasing rate with each extra year away.
The percentages of children living in migrant households without remittances are 10.27% and 11.22%, respectively, in Moldova and Georgia.
A third of investment from foreign remittances (World Bank 1981; p. 28, cited by Chowdhury 1992) and 20 25% black money is also invested in this sector (Chowdhury 1992).
