The National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) has said that from its recent survey, they found that 42% of Nigerians have lost their jobs due to the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic.
They revealed that the study was carried out between April to May 2020. This is the period when the index case was identified in the country.
From the study, we learnt that the impact of COVID-19 has been most strongly felt in the commerce, service and agriculture sectors.
While seventy-nine percent of households surveyed reported that their households’ total income have decreased since mid-March, NBS added that the economic shock experienced by Nigerians after the outbreak of Coronavirus far exceeds shocks experienced between 2017 and 2019.
In its report titled "COVID-19 IMPACT MONITORING", the NBS said,
“In order to track the impacts of the pandemic, the National Bureau of Statistics implemented the Nigeria COVID-19 National Longitudinal Phone Survey (COVID-19 NLPS) on a nationally representative sample of 1,950 households.
The most widely reported shock experienced by households was an increase in prices of major food items faced by 85 percent of households since the outbreak compared to only 19 percent between January 2017 and January 2019."
