Weekly Report - 20 April 2004

CENTRAL AMERICA | Remittance growth continues. Guatemala's central bank reports that remittances by expatriates in the first quarter of the year reached US$606.4m, or 29% more than in the same period of last year (a welcome development, seeing that in the same period export earnings were down 6.4%, to US$734.5m). El Salvador's central bank reports a first-quarter remittances inflow of US$560m, or 20.4% more than a year earlier (March's US$218.4m was a monthly record).