OFW funds from US seen to drop amid global crisis

MANILA, Philippines - Since it threatens jobs of Filipinos working in the US, the credit crisis in the world’s largest economy also poses a looming menace to the Philippines, a report by 24 Oras said.

“If Filipinos working in the US lose their jobs, it will be detrimental to the Philippines," former socioeconomic planning secretary Felipe M. Medalla said in an interview with 24 Oras reporter Sandra Aguinaldo.

Last year, three million Filipinos who lived and worked in the US sent home $7.56 billion, data from the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas website showed. The figure is expected to grow by 17.34 percent this year, the BSP said.

Current anecdotal evidence indicates that local beneficiaries of US-based Filipinos receive an average of $244 a month.

Meanwhile, Medalla, also a University of the Philippines (UP) economics professor, added that other countries will be affected by the US slowdown as well.

Being the world’s largest economy, the US is also among the largest trading partners of many countries, including the Philippines, the fastest-growing southeast Asian nation in 2007.

Approximately a fifth of Philippine exports are sent to the US and shipments are expected to fall since the crisis may cut demand for locally-made goods.

Medalla was reacting to reports of new cases of unemployment among Filipinos living and/or working in the United States.

The 24 Oras report aired Monday night featured interviews with two US-based Filipinos, one of whom had his house repossessed. The other, who worked for a bank, lost her job.

The newscast echoed an earlier GMANews.TV report which indicated that remittances are expected to fall since affluent economies employing workers from developing countries are seen to slow given the current global slump.

“Economies like the Philippines, and also in Central America, the Caribbean, perhaps in emerging Europe as well, will be affected by slowing inflows from remittances, in a similar way to slowing demand for their export goods," IMF Deputy Director Charles Collyns was quoted by an IMF transcript as saying.

Featured on the IMF’s website, the transcript covers the October 8, 2008 press conference organized in Washington, DC by the IMF. - GMANews.TV

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