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THE
economy will continue to benefit from sustained
remittances of overseas Filipinos for sometime still, no
matter that the deployment of Pinoy workers in the first
half fell significantly, regulators said on Monday.
According to the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP), the
continued rise in the ageing populations in Europe and
North America is seen to push sustained demand for
Filipino labor.
Medical
workers and assorted caregivers should form the bulk of
deployment in those areas, in step with the expected
rise in the number of senior citizens seen this year and
next, according to the BSP.
“Because
of this, we expect sustained strong inflows from the
remittances of overseas Filipinos,” deputy BSP governor
Diwa C. Guinigundo said.
The
remittances of overseas Filipinos have flowed at a rate
of more than a billion dollars a month for 13
months
in a series thus far, totaling $7.03 billion in the
first half.
What is
not apparent, however, is that the deployment of
sea-based Pinoy workers fell by 11.1 percent to just
123,950 while land-based workers fell 3.2 percent to
422,262 during the period.
The
declining pace of deployment has caught the eye of
relevant government agency heads who noted the annual
remittances account for 11 percent of the nation’s gross
domestic product and at least half the country’s foreign
exchange reserves at the moment.
The
sustained flow of worker remittances helped fuel
consumer spending that in turn pushed the GDP higher to
6.9 percent in the second quarter.
According to the Philippine Overseas Employment
Administration, deployment in the period contracted by
5.1 percent to only 546.212, making more imperative the
pursuit of the training and skills development programs
undertaken earlier by both government and private
employment agencies.
But
while government statisticians worry over employment
numbers, local sociologists continue to mourn over the
social cost borne by families of overseas workers,
particularly those whose parents were forced by
circumstances to work abroad at the same
time. |
