Economic Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Sri Lankan Migrants in Qatar
As of 5 July 2020, Qatar has the second-highest number of Covid19 cases in the Gulf Corporation Council (GCC) region with almost 100,000 cases, and the highest per capita rate of Covid19 in the world. Even though extensive contact tracing and testing by the Government of Qatar have helped to keep the country’s fatality rate at a low 0.1%, the Qatar economy is severely affected by the pandemic, akin to other countries grappling with high numbers of Covid19 cases. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) projects that Qatar economy will contract by 4.3% in 2020, becoming one of the economies most affected by the pandemic in the Middle-East.
The spread of Covid19 in Qatar and the pandemic-led economic slump in the country have substantial financial implications for Sri Lanka. Qatar has been one of the top three destinations among Sri Lankan labour migrants in recent years with an average of approximately 64,000 Sri Lankans leaving for Qatar between 2010 and 2017. According to the Sri Lankan Embassy in Qatar, as of 2018, nearly 140,000 Sri Lankans resided in Qatar and this tiny Gulf nation is one of the top five countries from which remittances to Sri Lanka originate with USD 508.4 million being sent from Qatar to Sri Lanka in 2017. Therefore, the impact of Covid19 on Qatar has a direct bearing, not only on Sri Lankans in Qatar, but their families in Sri Lanka and the Sri Lankan economy at large, and this article attempts to address these economic implications.
The article is based on a rapid online survey conducted between 3 and 15 June 2020. The sample of the study included 101 Sri Lankan workers currently based in Qatar. This included 78 highly-skilled, nine skilled and 14 semi-skilled workers. Eighty-two per cent of the respondents were males, and 18% were females, and the average age of the respondents was 36. The majority of the respondents were married with families residing with them in Qatar (57.4%) or Sri Lanka (30.7%). The rest were either single, divorced or separated.