DAILY CARTOON: Help From Foreign Keeps Coming

Jamaicans overseas sent more money home in the first eight months of 2026 than in the same stretch of any recent year, and for many families that money is still building the house.

KINGSTON, Jamaica, 29 October 2026

The story behind the cartoon

In today’s cartoon, three arms reach down from the clouds, one in a nurse’s scrubs, one in a winter coat and one in a high visibility work jacket. Each drops an envelope marked USA, UK or Canada into a beaming piggy bank labelled Remittances, which sits on the roof slab of a half built block house in rural Jamaica. Below, a grandmother waves her handkerchief, a father pauses with his trowel and the children look up and wave thanks.

It is a familiar Jamaican picture. Steel sticking up from the columns, blocks waiting in the yard, and the next stage of the house paid for by a relative working abroad.

What the numbers show

Remittance inflows to Jamaica reached US$2.42 billion between January and August 2026, up 5.3 per cent on the same period of 2025, according to the Bank of Jamaica’s latest remittance bulletin. That is the highest January to August total on the Bank’s chart, which goes back to 2018, ahead of the US$2.30 billion recorded for the same months in 2021.

August alone brought net inflows of US$294.2 million, up 9.4 per cent on August 2025. For the fiscal year to date, from April to August, net inflows came to US$1.46 billion, an increase of 5.9 per cent.

Where the money comes from

The United States remains by far the biggest source, accounting for 68.2 per cent of inflows in August. The United Kingdom provided 10.9 per cent, Canada 10.5 per cent and the Cayman Islands 6.0 per cent. Jamaica’s growth of 5.3 per cent for the year to date was broadly in line with Guatemala, at 5.4 per cent, and ahead of El Salvador and Mexico, the Bank said.

Why it matters

The Bank’s figures show how much the island leans on its people abroad. In 2025, remittances were equal to about 15.4 per cent of Jamaica’s GDP and roughly 85 per cent of what tourists spent here. That works out to about US$1,276 for every person in the country.

For many households, money from relatives in foreign covers bills, school fees and groceries, and helps put up one more course of blocks or a roof. It is a steady lifeline, but it also means that a slowdown in jobs or wages in the United States, the United Kingdom or Canada can quickly be felt in yards across Jamaica.

Every envelope from foreign is a block in the wall at home. Build wisely with it.