Iraq Market Monitor Report, Issue No. 30: April 2020
Highlights
Mitigation measures such as curfew and lockdown are negatively impacting the employability of daily casual labor as well as low income workers.
Losing a job or the disruption of livelihood sources are the primary concerns among households.
After a price hike observed in March, prices mostly remained stable during April.
Oil-based revenue fell from US $6.2 billion in January to US $1.4 billion in April. If oil prices are not restored, this loss of revenue might impact the implementation of social safety nets.
During April, the global impact of the COVID-19 pandemic continued to worsen. The total confirmed cases crossed the three million mark, with 75% diagnosed only during April. Although social distancing and mitigation measures have plateaued the curve over the past few weeks, more than 500,000 cases are still being reported globally every week.
In Iraq the total cases surpassed 2,000 on 30 April, while 92 people have died of the pandemic to date. There was a temporary dip in the weekly confirmed cases during week 16, when 440 cases per week dropped to 163. However, as the government eased the curfew and lockdown measures, the numbers jumped again to 445 new cases during week 18.
As confirmed by the air pollution map below, the economic activities in the country continue to shrink further amid COVID-19 mitigation measures. The most impacted economic activities are those that rely on daily casual labour.
Losing a job or the disruption of livelihood sources are among the primary concerns of the households interviewed though WFP's mobile Vulnerability Analysis and Mapping (mVAM) during April.1
