CAIRO: A study conducted in Kuwait and published by the official Egyptian news agency MENA said that Kuwait is the most important source for remittance from Egyptian workers abroad. It added that Egypt is one of the leading countries in exporting workers abroad from all professions and specialties and that the geographical distribution of Egyptian migrant workers is “expanding at the regional and international level, where in the region, Egyptian workers are heavily found in oil-producing countries in Arab Gulf States and Libya, and to a lesser extent in Lebanon and Jordan.” Mohammad el-Sakka, professor of economics at the University of Kuwait said in the study published on Friday that “at the international level, the Egyptian migrants are more based in the United States, Europe, and to a lesser extent in Japan, Canada and Australia, where migration by Egyptians are more to the oil-producing countries as temporary migration, where the laws do not allow in those countries to give an immigrant permanent residence and therefore Egyptian immigrants who prefer permanent residence abroad, prefer to go to countries that their laws allow to grant them permanent residence, in particular the United States and Europe.” He added that the Gulf States came in second place, in terms of relative importance as a source of remittances of Egyptian workers, adding that the Egyptian labor has transferred $1.504 billions from the Gulf states in 1999/2000 and has increased the total remittances of Egyptian workers from the Gulf States in 2008/2009 to $4.155 billion. He pointed out that Saudi Arabia was the most important sources of remittances for Egyptian workers until 2004, followed by the UAE and Kuwait, but this year, the remittances of Egyptian workers from Kuwait started to increase in an unprecedented manner, until Kuwait became the most important source back to Egypt. In the fiscal year 2007/2008 Egypt witnessed around $1.8 billion from Kuwait alone, which accounts for about 20 percent of the total remittances to Egypt from abroad, compared with $1.38 billion from the UAE and $969,4 million from Saudi Arabia. Thus Kuwait is the second most important source for remittances to Egypt after the United States. BM
