TUE, JULY 14 2020-theG&BJournal– Nigerian jobs soared since the beginning of May 2020 as the commerce and services sectors, those hardest hit by the COVID-19 crisis, as well as the agricultural sector experienced the largest recoveries, according to findings of the second round of the Nigeria COVID-19 National Longitudinal Phone survey (COVID-19 NLPS) conducted in June 2020 by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).
In similar survey in April/May 2020, just 43% of respondents reported that they were working, meaning that about half of those respondents who were working before the start of the COVID-19 outbreak had stopped working.
The latest survey findings showed that by June 2020, the share of Nigerians back to work have increased exponentially by around 70%, reflecting the ease of lockdown restrictions in May 2020.
‘’However, the share of respondents who were working in June was still lower than prior to the outbreak, indicating that the pandemic continues to limit individuals’ work opportunities,’’ according to the survey findings.
Between April/May and June, the share of respondents who were working increased in both urban and rural areas, but the loss of work since the start of the outbreak continues to be larger for urban dwellers.
While around 75% of rural respondents were working in June, 64% of urban respondents were working. Nevertheless, the recovery in the share of respondents who were working has been more pronounced in urban areas, although, in part, this is because the initial drop in the share of respondents who were working was larger for urban dwellers. The commerce and services sectors those hardest hit by the COVID-19 crisis –experienced among the largest recoveries in the share of respondents who were working, while many of those returning to work engaged in agriculture.
Of the 57% of respondents who were not working in April/May, a little under 60% had returned to work by June, while around 40% were still not working. Many of those returning to work (23% of those who were not working in April/May) started or resumed work in the agricultural sector. Yet relatively large shares of respondents who were not working in April/May reported working in commerce (17%) and services (15%) in June.
|twitter:@theGBJournal|email: info@govandbusinessjournal.com.ng|
