Vietnam to get more remittances this year: WB

By Nguyen Quy October 25, 2019 | 05:00 pm PT

An employee of a bank counts US dollar notes at a branch in Hanoi. Photo by Reuters/Kham.

Vietnam is expected to get remittances worth $16.7 billion this year, becoming the ninth biggest recipient in the world, a World Bank report said.

Slightly up from last year’s $16 billion, it would be equivalent to 6.4 percent of Vietnam’s GDP, showing that remittances continue to be an important for the country.

India is projected to top the 2019 ranking with inflows of over $82.2 billion, or 2.8 percent of its GDP, followed by China with nearly $70.3 billion, or 0.5 percent of GDP.

Remittances to Vietnam have been on an upward trend for the last two decades, starting at a mere $1.3 billion in 2000.

The increasing number of guest workers it sends abroad has made the country among the world’s leading recipients.

The Ministry of Labor, Invalids and Social Affairs’ department of overseas labor management said more than 104,000 workers went abroad to work in the first nine months of this year, up 2 percent from a year ago.