Home National Outflow of migrants declines

Outflow of migrants declines

Relatives offer tika to their kin traveling abroad for employment, at the Tribhuvan International Airport in Kathmandu, on Wednesday, December 7, 2016. Photo: RSS

Kathmandu, February 19, 2017: The outflow of migrant workers slipped to a three-year low in the first half of this fiscal.

According to the Department of Foreign Employment (DoFE), only 189,433 migrants left the country in the first six months of this fiscal, which is a  year-on-year decline of 9.93 per cent.

Data unveiled by DoFE reveal that the outflow of migrant workers has been declining after the earthquake. A total of 271,339 migrant workers left the country in the first half of fiscal 2014-15, which dropped to 210,315 in the same period of fiscal 2015-16.

According to Rama Bhattarari, director at DoFE, the number of foreign job-seekers declined in this fiscal due to lack of job opportunities in the labour destinations, especially in Gulf countries due to oil price shock.

“Also, as the government strictly enforced foreign employment rules issued to safeguard migrant workers, including free visa, free ticket provision, the manpower firms were cautious about sending workers in a haphazard manner to the labour destinations,” she explained.

As the outflow of migrant workers dropped, it directly affected the remittance inflow in the country.

Remittance growth has slowed down in this fiscal as compared to the corresponding period of the previous fiscal year.

Remittance inflow increased by 17.3 per cent in the first half of the last fiscal to Rs 323.69 billion, which slowed down to 5.7 per cent in this fiscal. The country received remittance worth Rs 342.23 billion, according to Nepal Rastra Bank.