BASELINE COVID-19 IMPACT MONITORING JULY 2020 Publication Date BACKGROUND While the first COVID-19 case was confirmed on April 2, Against this background, in May 2020, the National Statistical MALAWI Malawi had been declared in a state of disaster on March 20. Office (NSO), with support from the World Bank, has All schools were closed on March 23 and they have re- launched the High-Frequency Phone Survey on COVID-19 mained closed until now, impacting almost 6-million students. (HFPS COVID-19), which tracks the socio-economic impacts A planned nationwide lockdown was challenged in courts of the pandemic on a monthly basis for a period of 12 and was ultimately not implemented. Although the economic months. The survey aimed to recontact the entire sample of impacts of the crisis are still unfolding and subject to a households that had been interviewed during the Integrated healthy degree of uncertainty, GDP growth estimates for Household Panel Survey (IHPS) 2019 round and that had a 2020 have already been revised down from 4.8% to 2%. The phone number for at least one household member or a ref- adverse effects on livelihoods, particularly on the informal erence individual. This brief presents findings from the first economy, have been projected to be severe1 and poverty is round of the survey that was conducted during the period of forecasted to increase by up to 4.9 percentage points in ur- May 26-June 14. In Round 1, HFPS COVID-19 successfully ban areas and 2.2 percentage points in rural areas2. interviewed respondents from 74% of the initial target of 2,337 households. KNOWLEDGE AND CONCERNS OF Handwashing with soap as a measure to help re- duce the risk of contracting COVID-19 is known by 99% of respondents. The second most reported meas- ure is that of maintaining enough distance of at least 1 meter (76%) followed by avoiding crowded places or gatherings with many people (61%). Almost none of the respondents reported not having any knowledge of measures to help reduce the risk of contracting the virus. 94% of respondents reported to be very worried or dence of being very worried about becoming seriously ill is somewhat worried about themselves or their immediate high across the wealth distribution, despite the small gap family member(s) becoming seriously ill from COVID-19. between respondents living in households in the richest Similarly, 96% of respondents considered this crisis as a sub- quintile (88%) versus those living in households in the poor- stantial or moderate threat to their household’s finance. est quintile (92%). Similar findings emerge in the cross- Figures 2 and 3 break down the results by pre-COVID-19 quintile comparisons of the estimated incidence of perceiv- IHPS 2019 household wealth quintiles. The estimated inci- ing COVID-19 as a substantial threat to household finances. 1 The deceleration of growth to only 2% assumes that Malawi will not experience a widespread outbreak and the pandemic will be partially contained in the second half of 2020. With community level spread, the downside risk is much higher. Source: Malawi Economic Monitor (2020). 2 Source: An ongoing Policy Brief on socioeconomic impact of COVID-19 entitle “Beyond the Health Crisis: Covid-19's Impact on Jobs and Incomes in Malawi”. 1 COVID-19 IMPACT MONITORING ACCESS TO BASIC NEEDS 10% of households needed medical treatment but reported not being able to access it. Soap and cleaning supplies were re- ported as the most common items needed by households. Although most households were able to purchase the soap that they needed, 23% could not purchase cleaning supplies. While 51% of households needed to buy maize in the last 7 days prior to the inter- view, 29% of these households could not do so, mainly due to high prices and lack of cash/credit. EDUCATION Prior to all schools being shut down on March 23 rd, more than holds with school age children in urban areas and 3% in rural 94% of households with children between 6 and 18 years of age areas had any contact with their teachers. Among these stu- had at least 1 child attending school. Across urban and rural dents, 27% communicated with their teachers through SMS, 14% areas, and across wealth quintiles, school closures have caused a by telephone, 33% via WhatsApp, 18% through online apps, and drastic reduction in access to learning and education. 8% on Facebook messenger. For the 17% of households with Even in the wealthiest quintile only 25% of households are par- children between 6 and 18 with children engaged in educational ticipating in any type of learning activity. The comparable esti- activities, among students residing in rural areas the most com- mate was 7% in households in the bottom 20 percent of the pre mon activity was listening to educational radio programs (35%) -COVID-19 wealth quintile. The numbers are even lower for while in urban areas having sessions or meetings with a tutor students having contact with their teachers. Only 6% of house- was the highest reported (19%). FOOD SECURITY The prevalence of (i) severe and (ii) moderate or severe food insecurity, based on the Food Insecurity Experience Scale, among adult population is high throughout Malawi, though more pronounced in rural areas. The prevalence of moderate or severe food insecurity is highest among adults living in households in the poorest wealth quintile (86%). Adults living in households in the richest wealth quintile are experiencing the lowest levels of food insecurity, yet still more than half are experiencing moderate or severe food insecurity (52%). Data Notes: Nigeria COVID-19 National Longitudinal Phone Survey (COVID-19 2 COVID-19 IMPACT MONITORING EMPLOYMENT AND LIVELIHOOD The survey asked respondents about changes in their When considering the gender differences, 9% of both male employment status over the last week prior to the inter- and female respondents, respectively, reported that they view. Although most respondents continued to work as stopped working during the week prior to the survey. The usual, approximately 9% of respondents stopped working decline in employment appears to be broad-based though during that period. 68% of workers in rural areas have con- relatively larger shares of wealthier individuals reported tinued their usual economic activities compared to 73% of stopping their usual economic activities. A large share of small family-owned and operated businesses reported earning less revenue from sales after March 2020. This is true in both rural and urban Malawi. In urban areas 88% of businesses in the services sector re- ported lower or no sales revenue. Similar widespread reported decreases in sales revenue of services sector busi- nesses in rural areas. AGRICULTURE 90% of the HFPS-COVID-19 sample households engaged in crop farming during the 2019/20 rainy season. When asked if throughout Malawi. The use of safety measures against the COVID-19 outbreak has affected their crop harvesting COVID-19 was reported higher in Central Malawi. The decisions, 8% responded affirmatively and most of those main measure taken for COVID-19 safety during harvest that reported so were from North and Central regions. period were keeping social distance and staying home. Of the households whose harvest decisions were affected, When asked if livestock activities were affected, 5% re- delaying harvest due to COVID-19 is widely reported sponded affirmatively. Data Notes: Malawi High-Frequency Phone Survey COVID-19 (HFPS COVID-19) is implemented by the National Statistical Office (NSO) on a monthly basis during the period of May 2020 and June 2021. The survey is part of a World Bank-supported global effort to support countries in their data collection efforts to monitor the impacts of COVID-19. The financing for data collection and technical assistance in support of the Malawi HFPS COVID-19 is provided by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and the World Bank. The technical assistance to the Mala- wi HFPS COVID-19 is provided by a World Bank team composed of staff from the Development Data Group —Living Standards Measurement Study (LSMS) program and the Poverty and Equity Global Practice. In Round 1, 2,337 households that had been previously interviewed during the 2019 round of the Integrated Household Panel Survey (IHPS) were contacted, and 1,729 households were successfully interviewed, with the goal of re- interviewing them in the subsequent monthly HFPS COVID-19 rounds. The 2019 IHPS data are representative at the national- and urban/rural-levels and phone survey weights were calculated (i) to counteract selection bias associated with not being able to call IHPS households without phone num- bers, and (ii) to mitigate against non-response bias associated with not being able to interview all target IHPS households with phone numbers. For further details on the data, please visit https://www.worldbank.org/lsms-covid19 and email enquiries@statistics.gov.mw. 3