In Ecuador, COVID-19 could cause 11 percent dive in GDP this year

Ecuador, the first Latin American country hit by COVID-19, was already struggling as a result of the global oil crisis and could now see GDP plunge 11 percent in this year, a new UN assessment has found, arguing that expanding basic services, Internet access, and digital technologies will play a vital role in helping this South American country recover stronger.

The pandemic struck hardest initially in the city of Guayaquil, capital of Guayas province on the Pacific coast. Among 11 Latin American and Caribbean countries that have reported data on historically vulnerable indigenous groups, the Pan-Amerian Health Organization (PAHO) has said Colombia had the largest increase in cases and Ecuador the biggest increase in deaths among their indigenous populations.

The report describes the human impact of the COVID-19 crisis as “severe, [and] tied to the implementation of sanitary and social distancing measures to contain the spread of the virus. This led to the total or partial shutdown of economic activities, affecting the economy and the daily life of Ecuadorians.” The country’s commerce, industry, tourism, transport, and health sectors have been hit hardest–and lost jobs and income could increase the number of families living in poverty and extreme poverty.

The COVID-19 PDNA for March-May 2020 registered losses in Ecuador of US$6.42 billion, or nearly 6 percent of Ecuador’s nominal GDP for 2019. Preliminary needs focused on the social and productive sectors in the short-term total US$2.7 billion. To meet financing requirements, the EU earmarked US$10.6 million, the World Bank US$780 million, the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) US$624.8 million, the Development the Bank of Latin America (CAF) US$300.4 million, and the United Nations US$74.3 million.

In Ecuador, UNDP has helped establish Colaboratorio Ciudadano, a platform crowdsourcing citizens’ idea and connecting people working on similar projects. This peer-sharing platform has disseminated recipes for homemade disinfectants and patterns for sewing facemasks, and it has begun mapping the most vulnerable families to facilitate food deliveries to them. UNDP’s Accelerator Lab in Ecuador is also mapping and crowdsourcing local responses.

UNDP has provided personal protective equipment (PPE) to hospital staff in the western porvinces of Bolivar and Machala, as well as to farmers. It has also helped provide PPE to indigenous communities in the Amazon—Cofan, Sionas, Kchwa, Shuar, and Achuar—and procured chlorine for water treatment and cleaning and disinfecting health facilities.

UNDP has also expanded Chatbot tools that use artificial intelligence to guide citizens seeking information about the pandemic and implemented a remote assistance package for small enterprises to help local markets and businesses adopt safer, digital business strategies. UNDP has further provided training and cash to local associations of informal seamstresses, reorienting their production to the manufacture of biosecurity suits.

Original source: UNDP