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How Do Monthly Remittances Respond to Natural Disasters in Migrants’ Home Countries?

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The literature on the impact of natural disasters on remittances has provided mixed evidence so far, with identification remaining a key challenge. This paper studies the insurance role of remittances by investigating their dynamic response in the aftermath of a disaster. We use a novel and rich panel dataset of monthly remittance flows from Italy to 81 developing countries for the period 2005 to 2015. We find that monthly remittance flows on average increase by 2% due to natural disasters in migrants’ home countries. The response gets significant a few months after the event and tends to disappear within a year from the disaster occurrence. The intensity and timing of remittances’ responsiveness are heterogeneous according to the nature of the disaster, the receiving country’s characteristics, and migrants’ socio-economic conditions in the host country.

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  • Giulia Bettin & Amadou Jallow & Alberto Zazzaro, 2023. "How Do Monthly Remittances Respond to Natural Disasters in Migrants’ Home Countries?," CSEF Working Papers 673, Centre for Studies in Economics and Finance (CSEF), University of Naples, Italy.
    • Handle: RePEc:sef:csefwp:673
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    migrants’ remittances; international migration; natural disasters.;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • F24 - International Economics - - International Factor Movements and International Business - - - Remittances
    • F22 - International Economics - - International Factor Movements and International Business - - - International Migration
    • Q54 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Environmental Economics - - - Climate; Natural Disasters and their Management; Global Warming

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