Financial analysts expect overseas Filipino workers’ remittances to continue its modest growth this year due to higher deployments despite fears that the global financial crisis would lead to smaller money transfers.

Sun Life chief investment officer Michael Manuel said continued high remittances of OFWs would also temper the economic slow down in the country.

There are at least eight million Filipinos working abroad.

“The robust flow of dollars is attributed to higher demand for Filipino skills and talent abroad,” Manuel said.

Besides boosting consumer spending, remittances increase the Philippines’ foreign exchange reserves, further strengthening the country’s capacity to pay for debt and cover import costs such as oil and raw materials used for exports.

Data from the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas show that major sources of remittances were from US, Saudi Arabia, Canada, the United Kingdom, Italy, United Arab Emirates, Japan, Singapore and Hong Kong.

OFW remittances in November went up by 10.5 percent.

The data also indicated that in October 2008 alone, OFW remittances reached $1.4 billion — the highest monthly inflow recorded since 1989. It brought the 10-month remittance figure to $13.7 billion, 15.5 percent higher than the inflows for the same period in 2007.

Preliminary data from the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration showed that the number of Filipinos deployed overseas grew by more than 26 percent to 1.005 million in November last year compared with 798,731 in 2007.

Newly hired Filipinos were mostly deployed to the Middle East, particularly Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Qatar and Kuwait— and Taiwan and Hong Kong in Asia.

Some analysts, however, said the adverse effects of the global credit crunch might be felt in 2010 due to slower deployment of Filipino workers abroad in the second half of this year.*PNA

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