In 2011, countries in South Asia, South-East Asia and the Pacific received almost half the world’s remittances and the volume continued to increase in 2012.29 Indeed remittances are now on such a scale that they exceed government social expenditure or official development assistance. In the year ending June 2012 Bangladeshis sent home $13 billion, more than all the Government’s social protection programmes put together.30 Remittances have the advantage that they are often countercyclical, rising during economic downturns and natural disasters as migrants send more cash to meet their families’ emergency needs. This process is illustrated schematically in a model in Figure III-l.