Abstract
During one of most turbulent beginnings to a decade in recent history; we have observed the spread of a global pandemic with unprecedented socio-economic and financial consequences.
To better understand the impact of the shock induced by the pandemic on Egypt and assess the policy responses in a rapidly changing context, reliable data is imperative, and the need to resort to a dynamic data collection tool at a time when countries in the region are in a state of flux cannot be overstated. To fill this knowledge gap, the ILO commissioned The Egyptian Center for Public Opinion Research (Baseera), to conduct a rapid labor force phone survey, in order to study the impact of COVID 19 on the Egyptian labor market. The survey of working age (15 to 64) individuals was conducted on 24th - 30th of June 2020, collecting a sample of 2,033 individuals.
The ILO has then commissioned the ERF for the preparation of the harmonised data to be comparable with the COVID 19 Monitor data and is featured as the first wave for Household/Individual data for Egypt's COVID-19 Monitor; to be followed by 2 waves of data collected by Economic Research Forum (ERF)
These surveys aim to monitor the effect of the crisis on Egyptian households, workers, business owners and farmers as well as assessing the way in which these players are coping with the pandemic effects and their expectations regarding future income and job stability.
The “Poll on the effects of COVID-19 in Egypt” survey takes into consideration the key demographic and socio-economic characteristics of Egypt to understand the different distributional consequences of the impact of COVID-19 and responses to it, which allows to further study the effect of the pandemic on different vulnerable groups including informal and irregular workers, low skilled workers and youth.