The World Bank said remittances will decline sharply by about 23.1 percent to sub-Nigeria and other Saharan African nations this year, due to the economic crisis induced by the COVID-19 pandemic and shutdown.
Globally, a reduction of 20 per cent has been projected.
The projected fall, which would be the sharpest decline in recent history, is largely due to a fall in the wages and employment of migrant workers.
The migrants tend to be more vulnerable to loss of employment and wages during an economic crisis in a host country.
Remittances to low and middle-income countries (LMICs) are projected to fall by 19.7 percent to $445 billion, representing a loss of a crucial financing lifeline for many vulnerable households.
Remittance flows are expected to fall across all World Bank Group regions, most notably in Europe and Central Asia (27.5 percent).
Sub-Saharan Africa will follow with 23.1 percent.
Remittances to the region totalled $48 billion in 2018 and $57 billion last year.
South Asia will have a cut of 22.1 percent, the Middle East and North Africa 19.6 percent, Latin America and the Caribbean 19.3 percent, and East Asia and the Pacific 13 percent.
The large decline in remittances flows in 2020 comes after remittances to LMICs reached a record $554 billion in 2019.
Even with the decline, remittance flows are expected to become even more important as a source of external financing for LMICs as the fall in foreign direct investment is expected to be larger (more than 35 percent).
In 2019, remittance flows to LMICs became larger than FDI, an important milestone for monitoring resource flows to developing countries.
The World Bank estimates that remittances to LMICs will recover next year and rise by 5.6 percent to $470 billion
