MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Argentine expatriates transfer 225 million US dollars

Argentines living abroad sent back home in 2003 the equivalent of 225 million US dollars a 22% increase over 2002, according to the Interamerican Development Bank Investments Multilateral Fund which keeps track of funds transferred by Latinamericans overseas.

The sum includes transfers by legal residents and undocumented residents, mainly from the United States and Spain.

However even when many Argentines left the country in the midst of the 2001/2002 financial crisis and devaluation of the peso, the sum is well below the rest of the continent that annually received 38 billion US dollars.

Top of the list is Mexico with 13,3 billion US dollars; a second distant comes Brazil with 5,2 billion US dollars; Colombia, 3,07 billion US dollars; Ecuador 1,65 billion US dollars; Peru 1,2 billion US dollars; Bolivia 340 million and Venezuela 247 million.

Most Argentine overseas residents are in the United States and Spain. It is estimated Argentine expatriates send an average 500 US dollars per capita per month to relatives.

For Mexico transfers represent the third most important income behind oil and tourism.

In El Salvador, Central America it's the main source of foreign income. In the recent presidential elections Conservatives managed a landslide vote after warning that a left wing government could mean trouble for the many Salvadorians residing in the US and the many families who regularly receive the money transfers.