A United Kingdom-based digital payments platform WorldRemit has partnered with Digicel International to enable international money transfers to mobile wallets for customers in Fiji, Samoa, and Tonga.

According to a press release, thanks to the partnership, customers can now make international transfers via digicelinternational.com to Digicel MyCash mobile wallet accounts in Fiji, Samoa and Tonga. 

Money is received by the recipient securely into their mobile wallet within minutes, and is ready to spend on what they need by making purchases or transferring money straight from their MyCash wallet.

The initiative comes to support Pacific Island countries that rely heavily on remittances for basic living expenses, with remittances to Tonga representing around 40 per cent of the country’s GDP – the highest proportion in the world according to the World Bank. 

Besides, according to the International Organization of Migration (IOM), there has been a significant shift to digital remittances in the Pacific Islands as lockdown measures in both sending and receiving countries have made it more difficult to send and receive cash remittances.

Furthermore, the mobile money transfer service is available through the Digicel International website and app, which can be downloaded via Google Play and the App Store. 

To send money, customers only have to visit the Digicel International website or open their Digicel International app and chose the 'Send Money' option and follow the steps on their screen. 

After choosing their destination, they will select 'Digicel mobile money account' when making their mobile money transfer. Recipients receive the money directly through their Digicel MyCash wallets on their mobile phones.

A paper published by the Australian National University Development Policy Blog in August this year warned that COVID-19 will reduce the amount of global remittances into developing countries including the Pacific Islands.

“COVID-19 is expected to reduce the amount of global remittances in 2020 by 20 per cent. This sharp decrease will be a serious problem for countries like Tonga, Samoa, Kiribati, Fiji and Tuvalu, where remittances represent one of the main sources of hard currencies needed for international trade,” states the ANU paper’s authors Par Liljert and Rose Payne.

“In Tonga, remittances represent some 40 per cent of GDP – the highest proportion in the world.”