Philippine remittances up 6.2 pct in first half

MANILA, Philippines (Xinhua) - Philippine remittances in the first half rose 6.2 percent on year to $11.8 billion on steady global demand for skilled Filipino workers, the local central bank said today.

The sustained expansion in personal remittances during the first half of 2013 was boosted largely by the 5.1 percent growth in remittance flows from land-based overseas Filipino workers with work contracts of one year or more. Remittance flows from sea- based workers and land-based workers with short-term contracts grew by 7.5 percent.

Most of the remittances came from the United States, Saudi Arabia, the United Kingdom, the United Arab Emirates, Singapore, Canada, and Japan.

Latest data from the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA) showed that the number of workers deployed overseas in 2012 increased by 6.8 percent to 1,802,031 from 1,687, 831 in 2011. Majority of the new hires were employed as service, production, professional, and technical workers in Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Singapore, Hong Kong, and Qatar.