In February, expatriates sent 149 crores and 60 lac dollars million in remittances to the country, which amounts to Tk 12 thousand and 865 crores. However, this income is the lowest in the last 21 months. Earlier, in April 2020, the expatriates had sent remittance of 109 crores and 29 lac dollars. At that time the whole world was in turmoil for COVID-19. Although there is still an ongoing outbreak of COVID-19 all over the world now, the panic has abated. Even then, the bankers are worried about the remittance decreasing so much.
The government used to give a 2% cash incentive to remittances sent through banking channels. The incentive rate has risen to 2.5% since 1 January. Due to the increase in cash incentives, expatriates sent a significant amount of remittances in January. But in February it fell again.
In January, expatriates sent 170 crores and 44 lac dollars to the country – which amounts to 14.5 thousand crores in Bangladeshi currency (Tk 86 per dollar). Expatriate income has declined by more than Tk 1 thousand crores in one month, though February has only 28 days. Nevertheless, the rate of income decline is very high.
