The Financing Facility for Remittances is opening its 2008 call for proposals on ”Promoting innovative remittance systems and investment channels for migrants”. http://www.iadb.org/mif/newsDetail.cfm?language=English&ID=48
This Accion Internacional paper deliberates on the type of financial services which can help leverage the economic impact of remittances. http://www.microfinancegateway.org/files/46093_file_46.pdf
Germany is one of the most important countries of origin for remittances— money transfers from migrants. In 2006 they amounted to approximately ten billion euros. However, as this study shows, migrants face considerable difficulties with the transfer process. Despite its large volume, the market for money transfers is extremely intransparent. Intensive research is needed to discover which financial institutions offer what kind of services, and at what cost. In some cases the cost of these services is extremely high. The result is that transfers are frequently made through informal channels. http://www2.gtz.de/dokumente/bib/07-1374.pdf
Better and more coherent migration policies can contribute to the fight against global poverty. This is the main conclusion of “Migration and Developing Countries”, a new report by the OECD Development Centre that was presented at the German Ministry for Economic Co-operation and Development.
People, goods and capital move across international borders: this is what globalisation really means. The effects of trade and capital flows have been measured and quantified by the OECD and others and are widely known. Flows of people and their impact on development, however, are much less understood. By focussing on the costs and benefits of the movement of people Migration and Developing Countries shows how all parties can benefit from migration: migrants’ countries of destination, their home countries, and migrants themselves. Emigration, say the book’s authors, can reduce unemployment for low-skilled workers in migrant-sending countries, while remittances fuel consumption and investment, helping to reduce poverty.
While migration can contribute to development, development does not immediately halt international migration. International development assistance – aid – is not necessarily; therefore, a means of influencing migration flows. For this reason, Migration and Developing Countries calls for mutually reinforcing aid and migration policies. In this way, say the authors, developing countries can derive greater economic benefits from the mobility of their citizens. One example could be to link policies facilitating the recruitment of skilled workers to aid policies underpinning training and capacity building in the sending country. To unlock the development potential of international migration, policy makers in rich and poor countries must recognise that neither migration policies nor aid policies alone are enough in isolation to stimulate and maintain the momentum of development. OECD countries need to consider the development impact of their migration policies, while migrant-sending countries must rethink their development policies in the light of labour mobility. Moreover, migrants’ associations, enterprises and banks dealing with migrants and their families all play a role in increasing the development pay off of international migration.
http://www.oecd.org/document/46/0,3343,en_2649_33731_39207662_1_1_1_1,00.html
Manuel Orozco and Rachel Fedewa / INTAL 2006 Recent policy recommendations have stressed the importance of linking remittances to financial intermediation as a strategy to harness the development impact of such earnings. This paper attempts to identify emergent trends in the remittance and finance world that potentially point to a deepening connection between remittances and development vis-à-vis financial intermediation. It is a case study analysis of nine financial institutions, and focusing on three basic indicators: institutional ability to provide remittance transfers to its clients and community, to offer low cost remittance services, and to compliment transfer services with other financial services. http://www2.gtz.de/wbf/library/detail.asp?number=3557
The British are not investing a great deal in the developing world, but remittances from Britain are emerging as a growing counter to poverty, a new survey shows. Immigrants and their families from South Asia, Africa and the Caribbean remit on average 870 pounds (1,627 dollars) a family a year, according to a survey ordered by the Department for International Development (DFID). http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=34205
An United Nations report finds that remittances from Africans working abroad during 2000-2003 averaged about US$17 billion annually, while FDI flows averaged about US$15 billion during the same period. Official development assistance is still the main external resource flow for
Africa. The report highlights the need for reducing the cost of transmitting remittances to facilitate their transfer, and points out that the largest recipients of FDI have been countries with large mineral and petroleum reserves and growing natural resources industries.http://www.un.org/africa/osaa/press/Resource%20flows%20to%20Africa.pdf
