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RISING REMITTANCES NO SUBSTITUTE FOR DEVELOPMENT POLICY IN GUATEMALA.

Article Excerpt
The amount of money Guatemalans send home from their jobs in the diaspora, mainly the US, has reached a record high, but recent reports say the way in which that money is spent provides little help for the country's development (see NotiCen, 1996-12-05). In some ways, it retards development. Recipients spend on services that should be paid for by the state, letting the government off the hook in social spending. Guatemalans have sent home, so far in 2006, more than US$3.4 billion to some 3.7 million of Guatemala's 13 million people. Other beneficiaries of this avalanche of dollars are the coyotes who smuggle prospective workers into the US and the companies that charge hefty fees for sending the fruits of migrant labor back home, says an Oct. 26 survey from the International Organization for Migration (OIM). These 3.7 million people represent 918,819 households, an increase of 19.3% since 2004.

The OIM says that the 3.7 million Guatemalans who get a share of the US$3.4 billion spent US$283 million on health services, medicines, hospitalizations, doctor visits, and insurance in 2005. They spent US$203 million on education, including tuition, transport, school lunches, and school supplies. This amounts to only about 14.3% of the total, while a far bigger piece, 64.4% goes for consumption. What is left unsaid either...

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