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Summary
The International Day of Family Remittances (IDFR) is a universally-recognized observance adopted by the United Nations General Assembly (A/RES/72/281) and celebrated every year on 16 June. The Resolution establishing the International Day of Family Remittances (IDFR) was unanimously adopted by the UN General Assembly on 12 June 2018 (A/RES/72/281) following extensive negotiations and the lead of four UN Member States - Algeria, Guatemala, Madagascar, Philippines - who championed submission of the Resolution before the UNGA. The idea of having an IDFR was raised by private sector representatives in May 2013, at IFAD's Global Forum on Remittances - Asia-Pacific.
The day recognizes the contribution of over 200 million migrants to improve the lives of their 800 million family members back home, and to create a future of hope for their children. Half of these flows go to rural areas, where poverty and hunger are concentrated, and where remittances count the most.
Through this observance, the United Nations aims to bring greater awareness of the impact that these contributions have on millions of households, but also on communities, countries, and entire regions. The Day also calls upon governments, private sector entities, as well as the civil society, to find ways that can maximize the impact of remittances through individual, and/or collective actions.
The IDFR is fully recognized at the global level, and included as one of the key initiatives to implement the Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration– GCM (Objective 20), also calling for the reduction of remittance transfer costs, and greater financial inclusion through remittances. The Day also promotes achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and furthers the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.
Towards these objectives, the United Nations International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), as custodian of the IDFR, is supporting the #FamilyRemittances Campaign, to allow stakeholders to endorse the values the Day represents and to showcase their engagement.
This year’s observance theme will focus on the benefits that digital and financial inclusion bring when linked to remittances in helping remittance families achieve their own SDGs.
Remittances to low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) increased by an expected 5% to $626 billion in 2022, despite global headwinds. Compared to the 10.2% rise in 2021, this is significantly less, according to the most recent World Bank Migration and Development Brief (World Bank, 2022).
Remittance growth is anticipated to decrease in high-income nations (from a predicted 2.4 percent in 2022 to 1.1 percent in 2023), further lowering migrants' wage increases in host countries, and will drop to 2 percent in 2023. However, there are significant downside risks, such as a worsening of the conflict in Ukraine, fluctuating oil prices and currency exchange rates, and a more severe decline in important high-income economies (Migration and Development Brief, 2022).
Data from the past two years have demonstrated that remittances have remained resilient during the COVID-19 pandemic and ensuing economic crisis. Global crises have always been a testing ground for the resilience of any economy. Remittances have, time and again, stayed afloat due to the strong commitment of migrant workers to the well-being of their families back home.
IFAD needs to continue the effort and involve the public and private sectors to work together, to ensure migrants and their families have adequate access to remittances - particularly in rural areas where they count the most - and to financial education and related services.
Organizations
Main Implementing Organization(s)
Partner/Donor Organizations
Benefit and Impact
Furthermore, it presents an opportunity to highlight practices, initiatives, innovations and partnerships that are committed to facilitate faster, cheaper and safer transfers, and to link these funds to inclusive financial services for migrants and their families. The campaigns’ framework stimulated the creation of partnerships and implementation of initiatives on the ground aimed at lowering remittance transfer costs (SDG 10.c) and providing migrants and their families with tools and opportunities to learn, save and ultimately invest.
Key Lessons
The private sector showcased concrete steps to further digital and financial inclusion to improve access to and use of remittances by migrants and their families. Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, efforts were made by private sector companies to deploy cost-saving digital means to reach financially excluded and underserved populations. This required provision of a range of formal financial services suited to their needs that were responsibly delivered at a cost affordable to customers and sustainable for providers.
A number of public sector stakeholders developed national financial inclusion policies and collaborated with private sector entities to create favourable environments to allow remittances to flow in faster, cheaper and safer ways, linking them to tailored financial services for remittance families on both sides of the migration corridors.
Recommendations(if the practice is to be replicated)
• Build a strong rationale, linking the key topic to raise awareness of the key global/regional/national processes with that particular focus (i.e., remittances linked to several countries' Financial Inclusion Strategies);
• Research thoroughly to draft a good Resolution, considering the preamble and the past Resolutions/initiatives from which it could build;
• Ensure to have critical peer reviewers to destroy and rebuild the Resolution to have it UN-proof;
• "Translate" the Resolution to an everyday language, so it is easier to share its core values and actions through broader channels, i.e. social media;
• Mobilize partners to promote the Day's values, identifying a patron and/or an ambassador to inspire the global community;
• Give visibility to the endorsing partners as they are great allies to bring the core ideas forward onto their own network.
Innovation
The campaign highlights best practices and innovative solutions by our partners and industry players that have fostered financial inclusion through digital payments, as well as encouraging further commitments from diaspora networks and industry partners to work toward greater development and financial inclusion.
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*References to Kosovo shall be understood to be in the context of United Nations Security Council resolution 1244 (1999).