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Stephen T Chifamba

HARARE, (News of The South) – Latest data from the Rapid Poverty Income and Consumption Expenditure Survey (PICES) shows that 21% of those who were working pre-Covid-19 no longer worked in July with urban people being most affected.

Coronavirus has invaded all aspects of Zimbabwean life from communities to companies which have been forced to scale down operations.

The report done by the Zimbabwe National Statistics Agency, World Bank and Zimbabwe Reconstruction Fund focused on poverty and social impacts of Covid-19. The Rapid PICES phone survey is conducted for nine rounds starting from July 2020.

It re-interviews by phone about 1800 households from the Mini-PICES 2019, which is a subsample of the PICES 2017.

According to the report, 18% of all urban respondents were working before Covid-19 but no longer did in July 2020. Out of all urban respondents who worked pre-Covid-19, 23% no longer worked in July 2020. The number is 19% in rural areas.

The main reason for loss of work was business closure, the report said, “Due to the lockdown, seasonal effect and being laid off while business continued.”

“Urban areas are more impacted by Covid-19 direct economic shocks.”

Also, 40% of urban wage workers that kept working saw their pay reduced while in rural areas this impact was lower as there are fewer wage workers.

Of those in urban areas that kept working, 58% were wage workers urban people still working as wage workers faced income loss. Those who cannot work as usual, 40% saw their pay reduced.

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