The Global Covid-19 Recovery – Hopes and Fears
Let’s take a look at the rundown of the World Economic Outlook. If we focus on the development and growth of the GDP of nations of the world since 2018, there has been a lag in growth. This is majorly on the inputs of underdeveloped and developing countries. Reports of weakened sustainability, rising trade, and political tensions have badly affected the investment, trade, economic, and political spheres.
As a result of these challenges, many nations’ dreams and hopes for 2020 and 2021 are bleak. This already withering hope was further tarnished after the massive hit of the covid 19 Pandemic. The virus led to a major drawback on economic growth, and several aspects of countries developed, developing, and underdeveloped were all affected greatly.
The World After the Pandemic
At first, nobody had ever thought that the world’s nations would be able to move quickly away from the negative effects of the Covid 19 pandemic. But thanks to scientific researches and breakthroughs that proffered reliable means to conquer it, a lot of positivity can be seen.
The first approach was through various preventive measures. Face masks, social distancing, hand washing, regular cleaning, and sanitisation came in handy to curtail the spread. From there, the world saw an approach to being immune to the virus by creating vaccines. However, as this sounds great, we cannot overemphasise the devastating effects on the world economy.
Vaccination Concerns
There have been concerns focused on the response to the vaccination. Based on reports on the vaccines as of September 2021, 58% of the developed countries have been fully vaccinated,36% in developing countries, and just 4% of the underdeveloped countries. By implication, more than half of the world’s nations are not in full alignment to vaccinate 40% of their population in 2021. This is against the hope of developed countries who believe that by the end of 2022, covid 19 should have been eradicated, including any new variant.
The Worries of Economic Recovery?
On the aspects of the economic recovery, there are some concerns. The primary issue is that the year 2021 looks a lot better than the last. But with the pandemic still not curtailed, there is a great fear for another massive wave. This concern grows further in those expert predictions for the next three to four years that are looking a lot less pleasing than people would have hoped for three or four years ago.
Among the nations that have raised serious concerns are the developing Asian nations with the exclusion of China. According to expert analysts, their output is predicted to be 4.9% lower in 2024 than what was envisioned in the year 2020. As for Latin America, the reduction is 5%. China’s predicted output is 2.1% lower, and the world has a predicted negative output of 2.3%.
Economic and Health Distress
This, in effect, shows that the worst-hit people are the underdeveloped countries. They are also regarded as the most vulnerable people in this time of economic and health distress. The reason is simply that they lack the basic facilities both financially and medically.
Next in line on the most hit set of people are those from the developing countries where job loss was at its peak. Those affected were mostly low-skilled youths. Underprivileged children also suffered being out of school.
Although there have been stories of recoveries everywhere, employment has not risen beyond the pandemic level, and inflation has made it worse, especially in the oil and gas sector.
According to IMF, there might be more terrible times ahead. That is because there might be other outbreaks of variants of transmissible disease, pressures on prices of commodities, political challenges, climatic problems, cyber-attacks, technological tensions, conflicts between China and the US, and much more. However, these can be combated by two prompt actions: production and distribution of vaccines in a rapid way and an upsurge of sustainable productivity.
What Must Be Done?
- There must be cooperation among all nations on a common purpose on the vaccination
- Fiscal support must be flexible where it is necessary and tightened where necessary.
- Better UN Engagement
- Strong climate protection
References
https://www.imf.org/en/Publications/WEO
https://www.ft.com/content/cf2d5ad5-2b60-4398-a6d3-cbec8716d9ec
https://www.un.org/en/desa/one-million-people-share-hopes-and-fears-future-un