Philippine remittances rise 7.6% on Nov

Remittance from overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) rose 7.6 percent on year to 1.9 billion U.S. dollars in November on back of increased cash transfers, the local central bank said Tuesday. For the months between January to November, total remittances increased 6 percent on year to 19.4 billion U.S. dollars. This figure exceeded the central bank's projection of 5 percent growth in cash remittances from overseas Filipinos through banks for the full year of 2012. The central bank attributed this to steady demand for skilled and professional Filipino labor. Most remittances came from the U.S., Canada, Saudi Arabia, United Kingdom, Japan, United Arab Emirates and Singapore. The Philippine Overseas Employment Administration said the approved job orders for the whole year of 2012 reached 782,201. Of this, 42.2 percent consisted of processed job orders, largely for service, production and related workers, professional, technical and related workers to meet manpower needs in Saudi Arabia, UAE, Kuwait, Qatar, Taiwan and Hong Kong.