Workers’ remittances continue to plough ahead with US$ 544mn in May   

Remittance income from Sri Lankans working abroad has continued to remain robust through May as the country received US$ 544.4 million in the month. This is both, higher from a month ago levels as well as the year earlier levels.

Sri Lankan received US$ 543.8 million as remittances in April this year while in May last year the receipts were US$ 479.7 million.
For the five months through May, the country received US$ 2, 624.4 million from remittances, up 11.8 percent from the same period a year ago.

Sri Lanka’s remittances started normalising when the authorities began cracking down on the informal money exchanges that were offering substantial premiums to the official exchange rate.
The rupee depreciation also helped emigrants to re-route their earnings via banks which until then were repatriated via informal channels.

Further the record number of departures for foreign employment also helped Sri Lanka to receive strong amounts of foreign currency every month.
Sri Lanka is looking at roughly US$ 7.0 billion from remittances in 2024 which was similar to the levels received back in 2020.

Remittance income weakened to US$ 5,491.5 million in 2021 and further down to US$ 3,789.5 million in 2022 when certain political parties engaged in a widespread campaign to prevent migrants from sending back money by spreading falsities. They engaged in constant propaganda and peddled lies about dollars being stolen and concocted stories about sending dollars back to Uganda.
The Sri Lankan economy is once again showing some strength due to normalised flows from remittances and recovering tourism trade.