Filipino workers in Canada sent home a record C$335 million in the first nine months of last year. The amount was up a whopping 225 percent compared to the C$102.8 million they remitted in the same period in 2005.

Former senator and labor leader Ernesto Herrera attributed the big surge in money transfers to the “buoyant migrant labor market, particularly for professionals and other skilled workers,” in Canada. “Canada has been one of the biggest beneficiaries of the global commodities boom. Thus, the strong demand for skilled foreign labor there,”said Herrera, secretary-general of the Trade Union Congress of the Philippines. “Canadian companies have been aggressively drafting petroleum and mining engineers, construction and transportation workers as well as services staff,” said Herrera, former chairman of the Senate labor, employment and human resources committee.

Citing statistics from the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas, Herrera said the rapid growth of remittances from Canada easily beat the 68-percent and 67-percent increases in money transfers from the United Kingdom and the United Arab Emirates in the period under review.

In the nine months to September, Filipino workers in the UK sent home a total of  C$442.28 million, up 68 percent compared to the C$263.8 million they wired in the same period in 2005.

In 2005, Filipino workers in Canada wired home a total of C$117.06 million, up almost 74 percent versus the $67.34 million they remitted in 2004. At present, there are nearly 400,000 Canadians of Filipino origin. Canada receives an average of 10,000 Filipino nationals annually, making them the third-largest immigrant group in the nation. They are also the third largest Asian Canadian subgroup after the Chinese and Indians.

The Philippines is the most dependent nation on remittances from overseas workers due to lack of domestic fiscal capacity.

The Philippine economy stays afloat on external and volatile remittances from overseas Filipino workers (OFWs).

As in Canada,  OFWs around the world represent a strong force that influences the politics and economy in the Philippines.