[VIDEO] Impacts of COVID-19 on Households in ASEAN Countries and Their Implications for Human Capital Development

The outbreak of the COVID-19 virus and the resulting falls in demand due both to uncertainty and policy interventions such as lockdowns, ‘social distancing’ and travel restrictions are having a severe impact on Asian economies and hence on Asian households. These negative impacts come through a variety of channels, including: loss of employment or lower working hours, loss of sales and income of the household business, inability to travel to work, increased need to stay at home to look after children or sick household members, higher prices and/or lack of availability of staple items, reduced access to schooling, etc. Lowincome and vulnerable groups are likely to be particularly susceptible due to a lack of resources they candraw on during periods of reduced income. In order to develop appropriate policy responses, it is necessary 45to obtain a correct understanding of the current situation of households. As part of the Asian Development Bank’s overall strategy to deal with the current crisis, the ADBI has carried out surveys of households to better understand the size, aspects and incidence of impacts on vulnerable people. In particular, this study will focus on the implications for human capital formation of reduced access to education due to reduced school attendance because of the pandemic and inability to access online learning due to insufficient internet connectivity and lack of devices to connect. Specifically, we carried out computer-assisted telephone interview (CATI) and online surveys of households in eight ADB developing member countries—Cambodia, Lao People’s Democratic Republic (Lao PDR), Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, Philippines, Thailand and Viet Nam. (Face-to-face surveys were impractical due to the lockdowns being implemented in response to the pandemic.) The CATI surveys were implemented by Indochina Research Ltd. (IRL) and other subcontracting firms under the coordination and project management of IRL and overall quality control and direction of ADBI. The surveys were carried out from end of May to end of July. Representative samples of 1,000 households in each country were surveye