January 24-25, 2005International Technical Meeting on Measuring Migrant Remittances 1 Measuring Migrants’ Remittances: From the Perspective of the European Commission Mushtaq Hussain Eurostat, Unit C4

January 24-25, 2005International Technical Meeting on Measuring Migrant Remittances 2 Content Introduction EU Survey on workers‘ remittances Eurostat data collection Issues relevant for current discussions

January 24-25, 2005International Technical Meeting on Measuring Migrant Remittances 3 Introduction International migration is a global phenomenon with high political interest Migrant remittances have accompanied the evolution of migratory flows Recent initiatives try to –Analyse role of remittances in development process, and –Establish conceptual framework for collecting statistical information

January 24-25, 2005International Technical Meeting on Measuring Migrant Remittances 4 Recent initiatives Inter-Agency Remittance Task Force G8 Action Plan Technical Subgroup on the Movement of Natural Persons – Mode 4 Various surveys and studies

January 24-25, 2005International Technical Meeting on Measuring Migrant Remittances 5 EU Survey on workers’ remittances The European Commission conducted in March/April 2004 a survey of Member States to find out: importance of workers’ remittances from the EU, amounts of money involved, the countries of non-resident counterparties, main transfer channels in use, the transfer costs, and regulatory conditions.

January 24-25, 2005International Technical Meeting on Measuring Migrant Remittances 6 EU Survey: Main Results 1 Flow from 11 MS in 2003: €17 billion Data not of desirable quality Underestimation of remittances Minimum threshold of € for data reporting Geographical breakdown of remittances correspond main origins of migrants

January 24-25, 2005International Technical Meeting on Measuring Migrant Remittances 7 EU Survey: Main Results 2 Five main categories of transfer channels: –Banks –Non-bank money transfer operators –Post offices –Cash and commodities carries –Informal money transfer services Information about market shares available for a few MS only –two-third channelled through banking system or registered non-bank money transmitters –Other third is made up of other channels

January 24-25, 2005International Technical Meeting on Measuring Migrant Remittances 8 Eurostat Data Collection 1 Quarterly questionnaire on current account includes: –General government current transfers (380) –Other (private) current transfers (390) Annual questionnaire on ITS used to ask following additional Information too: –Workers‘ remittances (391) –Other private transfers (392) Since 2003 annual ITS questionnaire concentrates on Services only and data on remittances are not asked anymore.

January 24-25, 2005International Technical Meeting on Measuring Migrant Remittances 9 Eurostat Data Collection 2 In the newest quarterly questionnaire on current account we have included: –Workers‘ remittances (391) –Other private transfers (392) and asked the MS to provide data starting from reference period 1st quarter 2005 for a selected number of partners including World, intra-EU, extra-EU, Canada, Japan, USA.

January 24-25, 2005International Technical Meeting on Measuring Migrant Remittances 10 BOP Regulation 1 Regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council on Community statistics concerning balance of payments, international trade in services and foreign direct investment: adopted in June EU-MS will have legal obligation to send data with BOP items and with geographical breakdown as mentioned in the regulation. First reference period for quarterly statistics: 1st quarter Regulation foresees data on general government current transfers and other current transfers with extra EU countries only. Workers’ remittances are not mentioned in the regulation.

January 24-25, 2005International Technical Meeting on Measuring Migrant Remittances 11 BOP Regulation 2 One reason for this is the fact that the discussions on the regulation started much before workers’ remittances became important in the political discussions. The BOP working group and the BOP committee of the European Commission (to be established soon) will take this issue in their agenda and discuss with the EU Member States about the possibility of reporting data on workers’ remittances. A political support from IMF and the World Bank will certainly help this process.

January 24-25, 2005International Technical Meeting on Measuring Migrant Remittances 12 Issues relevant for current discussions Definition of residence Definition of workers’ remittances Promotion of official channel of money transfer Consistent methodology for estimating informal flows Necessity for household surveys for additional information Longitudinal surveys seem to be more appropriate.

January 24-25, 2005International Technical Meeting on Measuring Migrant Remittances 13 Thank you for your attention