The remittances received by the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean during the first half of 2022 reached 68,002 million dollars (about 68,943 million euros), continuing the growing trend of historical maximums in 2021, when 128,000 million dollars were sent, according to a compilation of national data from the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB). Despite the crisis after the pandemic and the impact of the war in Ukraine on the economy, this was the highest growth in almost 20 years. Experts point to the resilience of migrants and a gradual economic recovery as keys to these figures on which thousands of families depend. For Sonia Pelliecer, coordinator of studies on remittances at the International Organization for Migration (IOM), although these figures give “oxygen” to the economies of the countries of origin, they also denote a certain stagnation: “It is very common that in the communities of my country (Guatemala) everyone longs for their sons and daughters to go abroad to work. It is becoming something structural to find opportunities outside”.
The money that migrants send home is an essential contribution to their subsistence. In many cases, it is the only source of income and the main reason why young people migrate. The weakened labor market in some Latin American countries, inflation and labor conditions mean that saving in dollars is the only option to get ahead.
In addition, Latinos abroad have benefited from an improvement in the economy and the continuity of some government economic support. That is why in the first quarter of this year, remittances grew by 31,678 million dollars, 14% more than in the same period of 2021, according to World Bank estimates. The second quarter, the increase was 17%, with a record of 36,325 million. Another possible cause of this increase, according to Jeremy Harris, migration specialist at the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), is the growth of emigration. “The number of migrants from Latin America and the Caribbean has more than doubled from 7.18 million in 2005 to 14.8 million in 2020″, he explains. “It is an increasingly recurring way of seeking well-being.”
This is what María Bilbao, 56, thought of when she emigrated in 2001 from Buenos Aires, Argentina, to Miami, United States. She traveled there with her husband “knowing that it was most likely that they would not return.” She was undocumented for 17 years and worked irregularly as a domestic worker during that period. She is now the coordinator of an NGO that helps other migrants. Despite spending decades away from it, this year, for the first time, she has sent money to her country of origin. “I had never sent money to my mother or my family because it was not necessary. They weren’t bad,” she says over the phone. “But since December I have been sending around 200 dollars”, about 60,000 Argentine pesos through the international money order company. As she explains, inflation has meant that neither pension nor retirement are enough and sending remittances is a way of being present from a distance. “Saving 200 dollars is not that difficult for me and there is a world. With that I pay 20 days a month for a person who takes care of my mother at night, ”she points out.
Argentina and Brazil were the South American countries whose remittances grew the most in the second semester, 32.1% and 16.5% respectively. Nicaragua was the Central American country that saw this percentage grow the most, almost 39%. For Harris, the case of Argentina is due to the increase in the exchange rate: “The appreciation of the dollar with respect to local currencies makes their purchasing power greater. This effect is not usually permanent, although it does seem to have influenced this period”. In the case of Nicaragua and Brazil, he believes, it is due to the growth of the migrant population of both nationalities. Between 2015 and 2018, the number of residence permits granted to Nicaraguan citizens doubled and the number granted to Brazilians grew by 76%.
Remittances received by Mexico in the second quarter of the year reached a new quarterly record high, with an amount of 15,043 million dollars, a figure 20.1% higher than that of the previous quarter. It is 15.4% higher than that observed in the same quarter of last year. This case is, according to Jesús Alejandro Cervantes, director of Economic Statistics and Remittances Forum of Latin America and the Caribbean, paradigmatic. “The increase in money sent by Mexicans abroad is due to their greater effort, because it has been seen that the families most affected by the pandemic and the economic crisis are those for whom this money was, if not the only source of income, the main one,” he explains by phone. Mexicans also had access to more jobs with higher average pay. “The higher wage bill and the worsening of the situation in their countries of origin meant that there was no other option than to send more money,” he says. For the expert, this reality is also shared by Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador, the Dominican Republic and Colombia, the countries that combine 80% of these savings.
Join EL PAÍS to follow all the news and read without limits.
subscribe
There are different ways to assess whether or not this trend is positive. “From the point of view of the well-being of families in the countries of origin, the increase in remittances is good, but, at the same time, it is an indicator that they continue to need your support. For many families in the region, emigration continues to be the alternative for their well-being,” says Harris. For his part, Pelliecer, from the IOM, adds: “We have to open the conversation and think about how to do with these savings so that there is no need to leave to have opportunities, that the money stays and creates opportunities here.”
#Latino #migrants #broke #remittance #sending #records