Hundreds and thousands have lost their jobs while many others faced wage cuts due to the adverse impact of Covid-19 pandemic on all sorts of economic activities, according to available information.
Readymade garment (RMG), the country's largest foreign currency earner that fetches more than 83 per cent of the total export earnings, has taken a lead both in job and wage cut.
A number of studies have revealed that the pandemic has created certain adverse impact on the country's economy, especially on the employments.
The findings of a recent research by a2i titled "Post COVID-19 Jobs and Skills in Bangladesh" revealed that over 20.4 million workers are currently unemployed across 11 high-impact sectors of the economy.
The sectors included informal sector and SMEs, transportation, construction, furniture, RMG and textile, leather goods and footwear, tourism and hospitality, light engineering, migration, real estate and housing, and ceramic.
Of these, the informal and SME sectors, transportation and construction are the immediate losers. An estimated 18 million jobs were lost in these sectors. .
The study has made a forecast that an additional 5.5 million workers will lose their jobs by the end of this year while over 2.53 million more in the next year, 2021.
On the other hand, according an ADB (Asian Development Bank) report, job postings in the largest online job matching sites including Bdjobs.com, Chakri.com, JOB.COM.BD, and alljobsbd.com have declined since the COVID-19 outbreak.
In April 2020, the number of job postings for Bangladesh was only 13 per cent of the total jobs posted in April 2019.
Compared to April 2019, the number of job postings in April'20 was down by 95 per cent in textile, education and industries and by 92 per cent in the manufacturing industry.
The trend in online job applications in Bangladesh also followed a similar trajectory. Over 60,000 jobs were posted on bdjobs.com in 2019. There were 200,000 visitors and over 1.0 million page views per day.
Relative to December 2019, the number of new job postings was about similar in January 2020, and 10 per cent to 17 per cent fewer in February and monthly job postings were 35 per cent fewer in March, and 87 per cent fewer in April 2020.
Another latest report by International Labour Organization (ILO) and ADB projected that some 1.11 million to 1.67 million youths in Bangladesh might lose jobs in 2020.
The agricultural sector might see the highest 22.9 per cent loss of jobs in Bangladesh, followed by 13.6 per cent in textile and apparel sector, 12.8 per cent in construction and 12.1 per cent in retail trade sector, according to the ILO-ADB joint report.
According to Bangladesh Rice Research Institute (BRRI), wages of agricultural workers during the Boro season declined this year compared to that of 2019.
Sylhet and Rajshahi witnessed the highest 17 per cent fall in wages, followed by Rangpur 15 per cent, Bagura 13 per cent, Dinajpur 11 per cent, Faridpur 10 per cent, Barisal 8.0 per cent, Mymensingh 4.0 per cent and Khulna 1.0 per cent.
The a2i research revealed that approximately 0.5 million workers are permanently unemployed in textile and RMG sector and many others are on the verge of being laid off due to the on-going crisis.
Also, employment interconnected with this industry is affected; with four million truck drivers, port workers and suppliers are at risk of losing their jobs.
Many factories are still paying salaries and with the government stimulus package in place, many bottom level employees have been saved from the harsh reality of creating unemployment.
But some of them have laid off thousands of workers permanently due to the likely decrease in consumption and demand of garments products. Many small factories have already been driven out of the business.
Official data from the Industrial Police revealed that at least 22,400 RMG workers were fired until July 20 while the labour ministry data said some 20,000 RMG workers lost jobs.
Labour leaders, however, claimed that the number is much higher than what the official data showed
Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BGMEA) claimed that some 376 factories were closed during the pandemic, affecting both entrepreneurs and workers.
Bangladesh's garment workers lost an estimated US$501 million or 29.5 per cent of their total monthly wages during the period from March to May, according to a report of Clean Clothes Campaign (CCC), a global rights group.
In April, RMG workers received 65 per cent of their monthly wages while many small and medium-sized enterprises that worked as subcontractors for big factories and factories that announced layoffs have been unable to qualify for funding due to the conditions and, as a result, they could not pay wages of their workers.
Not only workers, staff and other employees of different sectors including corporate houses saw cuts in their salaries with their work from home activities or physical presence at offices by rotation. Many of them did not get Eid bonus while some of them got partial payments. Some banks terminated their contractual employees, cut salaries of their officials and employees and did not pay any incentive to employees who were present physically risking Covid infection.
The ILO-ADB joint report on youth employment projected that 2.6 per cent of the total youth employment aged between 15 to 24 years might lose jobs in hotel and restaurant sectors this year.
When asked, Anwar Hossain, general secretary of Bangladesh Hotel, Restaurant and Sweetmeat Workers' Federation, claimed that during the pandemic especially in the lockdown, 70 per cent of the total 3.0 million workers in this sector lost their jobs.
With the opening of economic activities, though hotel and restaurants have started operation, still 50 per cent of the workers remained unemployed, he said, explaining that owners are running their business with fewer number of workers and offering lower wages and increasing the working hours.
He alleged that no worker received wages and festival bonus during the closure-period.
In the construction sector, according to a2i report, around 1.0 million workers became unemployed. Besides, the shutdown has put livelihoods of 1 million people are at risk.
The ILO-ADB report projected that 12.8 per cent of the total youths would lose their jobs in construction sector in 2020 while a2i estimated that 30 per cent or 1.14 million out of 3.8 million workforce in the sector will be laid off by 2020.
People are unlikely to make expensive purchases such as apartment due to the economic turmoil caused by the Covid-19, industry insiders said.
The industry has an unsold inventory of about 20,000 apartments, according to a2i findings that added, in Dhaka and Chattogram, there are presently 3,000 under-construction housing projects, comprising approximately 60,000 apartments, at different stages of construction.
Besides, leather goods and footwear sector directly employs 200,000 local workers out of which 60,000 have already been unemployed, according to a2i report.
Moreover, the sector also employs approximately 700,000 workers in the domestic market.
According to Bangladesh Paduka Prostutkarok Somiti (BPPS), some 525 members have created 545,000 indirect employments and 154,000 direct employments.
In the domestic fotwear market, about 50 per cent or 0.35 million people have lost their jobs, it showed.
The country's road transport sector is another hard-hit sector that provides employments for nearly 5.0 million people. However, talking to the sources, the FE correspondents got information about the current employment status in the sector which is contradictory.
The transport owners said the employment has become almost normal, whereas the workers claimed half of them are still unemployed and not getting minimum support from the owners.
Bangladesh Road Transport Owners Association secretary general Khandaker Enayet Ullah said the employment situation in the sector has recuperated as the government is now allowing all the transports to operate.
"The transport sector has become normal after Eid on the back of increased number of vehicles plying following the lockdown," he said, adding that 30 to 40 per cent of the total vehicles were operational between June and before Eid-ul-Azha.
Both the number of transports and passengers have somewhat increased after the Eid which positively influenced employment in the sector, he added.
According to his estimate, currently there are around 0.4 million buses, trucks and minibuses which have created nearly 3.0 million employments.
Bangladesh Road Transport Workers League general secretary Insur Ali said there are around 7.0 million workers in the sector if all sorts of vehicles including human haulers and others are taken into account.
"Still almost half of them are unemployed," Mr Ali said, adding that they are being deprived of their rights as no formal agreement is done between transport owners and the workers.
He also blamed the transport owner for not providing the workers with any kind of support in the pandemic though a section of owners collected huge amount of money in the name of welfare fund.
According to different researches and sources, tourism and hospitality sector emerges as the most-affected sector in the long-term with almost 2.0 million jobs estimated to be lost by 2021.
There are about 3,500 travel agencies and 500 unregistered agencies in Bangladesh in which 4.0 million people were affected directly or indirectly as the tourism and hospitality industry has faced severe setback.
It is estimated that over 1,000 travel operators around the country have laid off approximately 8,000 employees while about 2,300 hotels have let go of 14,000 employees, and cruise vessels laid off 5,000 employees; bringing the tally to 27,000 in the sector.
Contacted, Md Rafeuzzaman, president of the Tour Operators Association of Bangladesh (TOAB), said tour operators did not sack their staff though hit-hard by the pandemic.
"As far as I know, our members' firms have slashed the salaries by 50 per cent or other amounts in a bid to survive," he said and added that there are 686 members of the trade body.
Terming the staff valuable resource for the sector, the TOAB president also said that it takes huge investment of time, money and energy to enhance a staff's skill as tour managers or guides.
However, he acknowledged that a number of businesses in the subsectors like hospitality and transportation have had to lay-off the employees.
A manager of a hotel in Cox's Bazar, on condition of anonymity, said that more than two-thirds of the employees at different lodging facilities have been laid off in the recent months.
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