The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) reported that cash remittances grew 6.7 percent in September, hitting the $2.38-billion mark.
According to BSP Governor Amando Tetangco Jr., the amount of money sent by Filipinos abroad in September was $149 million more than the $2.23 billion in the same month last year.
Cash remittances from land-based workers rose 11.9 percent in September alone, compared to those sent by sea-based workers which dropped by 10.5 percent.
Tetangco said the decline can be attributed to stiffer competition in the supply of seafarers.
“A growing number of officers and ratings are recruited from East Asia (China and India) and Eastern Europe (Ukraine, Croatia, and Latvia),” Tetangco said in a statement.
Among the major sources of remittances are the US, United Arab Emirates, Japan, Qatar, Taiwan and Kuwait.
The BSP chief also revealed that from January to September this year, cash remittances went up 4.8 percent to $20.02 billion from $19.1 billion in the same period last year, exceeding the four percent growth target set by the central bank for 2016.
He said remittances from land-based Filipino workers rose 7.1 percent ($15.8 billion) while that of sea-based workers declined 2.9 percent ($4.2 billion).
Central Bank records show that about 80 percent of the remittances are from the US, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Singapore, the United Kingdom, Japan, Qatar, Kuwait, Hong Kong, and Germany.