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Remittances to India will fall 23% to $ 64 billion, the World Bank said on Wednesday, calculating the impact of the coronavirus disease on a vital source of entry to India and other countries. They grew 5.5% to $ 83 billion in 2019. Globally, remittances are expected to decrease 20% in 2020. In low-income (per capita less than $ 1,025) and middle-income countries (including countries Lower middle income countries with per capita income between $ 1,026 and $ 3,995, and upper middle income countries with per capita income between $ 3,996 and $ 12,375) are expected to decrease in almost the same proportion, 19.7%.
Low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) receive the majority of remittances. In 2019, these totaled around $ 554 billion out of a total of around $ 710 billion (78%). This year that number will drop to $ 445 billion (from a total of $ 568). The World Bank expects remittances to LMICs to grow 5.6% to around $ 470 in 2021, but with the trajectory of Covid-19 still unclear, all estimates are just that: estimates. Many countries will tighten up their immigration laws in the wake of the pandemic, the United States has already done so, and even those that are unlikely to host foreign workers, at least not until a vaccine is discovered and readily available.
With 15.16% of all remittances to low- and middle-income countries (India is a lower-middle-income country), and almost 12% of all global remittances, India is at the top of the list of countries receiving money of workers abroad. At 3.36% of GDP, it is not as high as in some countries, but the $ 83 billion it received in remittances last year was still higher than the estimated $ 49 it attracted in foreign direct investment (according to an investment tracker by UNCTAD). According to the World Bank, in 2019, remittances became higher than FDI at an aggregate level for LMICs, highlighting how important these inflows are.
Falling remittances by almost a quarter is bad news for India, whose economy, like that of most other countries, has been devastated by the virus and is therefore universally accepted as the only way to flatten the curve. of infections (a blockage, which significantly impacts economic activity).
Is the curve flattening out? An optimistic reading of the number of daily cases registered worldwide and in the United States. USA And the UK (among the worst affected countries) seems to suggest that. The number of daily cases in the US USA On April 22 it was 29,973 according to worldometers.info. In the UK, it was 4,451. And worldwide, there were 79,956 new cases on April 22. That number is still high, but it is definitely outside the peaks seen in the last fortnight. The reason there is no point in being optimistic about something related to Sars-CoV-2, the virus that causes Covid-19, is simply this: every time the curve seems to flatten out, the virus finds a new hot spot, or several , which then proceeds to invade.
Still, it makes sense to look closely at the numbers. As of April 22, the number of Covid-19 infections was 2,639,025. Of this number, 184,263 people have died (which is a lot), and 722,150 have recovered. There are 1,732,612 active cases, but 97% of these (1,674,355) are mild. All data (and forecast) are from worldometers.info.
In India, the number of cases was 21,367 on April 22. Of this number, 683 people died and 4,373 recovered. The number of new cases in the seven days until April 22 (including April 22) were: 1067, 953, 1304, 1598, 1248, 1504, and 1363. All Indian data comes from HT control panel. As an anecdote (according to what the health ministry officials tell us), very few of the infected people in India receive ventilation assistance. Most, they add, are asymptomatic, which, along with quarantine, blockade, and pandemic, is an early candidate for the word of the year 2020.
