REMITTANCE INCOME AND MIGRANT ENTREPRENEURSHIP IN CENTRAL ASIA

Year 2020, Volume: 2 Issue: 1, 97 - 112, 31.01.2020

Zhengizkhan Zhanaltay

Abstract

For many Central Asian citizens labor migration has become a part of their lives mainly due to difficult economic condition in their hometown like high unemployment rate and low wages. In order to cover the economic needs of their families majority of the labor migrants send 30-50% of their earnings back home which in total becomes large sums comparing with their home country GDP. In 2017, Central Asian countries in total has received $5 billion remittance inflow in 2017 where the remittance share to GDP for Kyrgyzstan is 35% and for Tajikistan is 31% one of highest ratios in the world. The potential of remittance incomes on contributing the economic development in these countries has been widely discussed in literature. However, there is lack of information on turning this opportunity into reality part. This paper aims to analyze the recent remittance dynamics and their effect on the economic development in home country.

Keywords

remittance, labor migration, entrepreneurship, Central Asia, income

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