Tegucigalpa, Honduras.
Remittances remain the livelihood of thousands of Honduran families, and 2020 was no exception.
Despite the forecasts for the first semester, where a sharp decline was expected, they reached a record 5,595.5 million a week before the end of the previous year dollars (L135.411 million).
The Central Bank of Honduras (BCH) reported through a December 22 weekly summary that the main inflows of foreign currency into the country were family remittances, which accounted for nearly 50% (47.4%) of total income and showed an increase. of $ 229 million compared to the $ 5,366.5 million entered on the same date in 2019.
In percentages, the year-on-year increase was 4.3%.
In 2019, the increase in remittances was 13%, to 5,400 million, so many experts believe that if the pandemic and economic crisis were not global, the increase in 2020 would have been much larger.
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Despite the fact that international organizations had predicted a drop of up to 20% in the influx of remittances into Honduras, this has not happened. According to the Social Forum on External Debt and Development in Honduras (Fosdeh), this was the result of the fact that in the countries where remittances are sent, reopening was faster and despite some restrictions, economic activity did not stop. It was easier to generate income for the Honduran migrants.
The major countries where family remittances come from are mainly from the United States with 80% representation.
second Spain at 8%, then Costa Rica at 2%, Mexico at 1.6% and other countries with 8.2%.
Figures from the Permanent household survey from the National Institute of Statistics (INE) reveal that family remittances support nearly 190,000 Honduran households and are the third source of income of the more than 2.2 million households, surpassed only by wages and home-source income.
Claudio Salgado, an economist, pointed out that foreign investment continues to decline and therefore the country remains dependent on the money migrants send.
The comprehensive system of attention for returnees reported that in 2020 21,879 Hondurans were deported, mostly adult men.