Merit Ibe
With the loss of businesses during the lockdown which restricted people and disrupted businesses in the past weeks, the Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI), has posited that a holistic national plan of action coordinated collaboratively was critical and urgent to enable businesses navigate through the current storm caused by the pandemic.
Recognising the role of business and investment in the economy, the chamber noted that it was imperative for public and private sectors to make concerted efforts to protect businesses, jobs and income, fine-tune human resources policy and strategy with a view to reorganising work and make production adapt to the new reality.
The chamber made the disclosure in a statement by its Director-General, Muda Yusuf, on its survey report on “Lockdown and its impact on Businesses.”
The LCCI boss disclosed that during the survey conducted by the chamber, it discovered that during the lockdown, 81 per cent of businesses were affected, while 50 per cent were severely impacted in the services sector.
The profound impact on the services sector, the chamber explained, was as a result of lower demand for services by individuals and corporate clients. “During the lockdown, clients prioritised food and essential items ahead of ‘relatively less important’ services, and corporate clients ran skeletal operations, which depressed demand for {non-essential} services.”
In line with its mandate of ensuring an enabling environment for the general business community, the chamber noted that it carried out the survey to determine the impact of the lockdown on businesses, using Lagos State as a case study. The choice of Lagos, according to the director general was informed by its commercial and economic importance. The survey captured business operators across various sectors of the economy including food processing, agriculture, financial services, professional services, ICT, exports, trade and freight forwarding.
According to the findings of the survey, the degree of impact on businesses showed that a significant fraction of sampled businesses (precisely 81 per cent,) were ‘severely’ affected by the lockdown with 17 per cent indicating moderate impact on their business.
With the above observation, the chamber noted that it was imperative to have a strategy aimed at enabling businesses navigate through the current storm caused by the pandemic and jumpstarting the economy in general.
The director general therefore, posited that the government and the organised private sector needed to take actions that are holistic for the business community and for the economy, noting that a national plan of action coordinated collaboratively was critical and urgent.
He pointed out that public and private sectors must make concerted efforts to protect businesses, jobs and income.
Yusuf emphasised the need to fine-tune human resources policy and strategy with a view to reorganise work and make production adapt to the new reality, adding that joint actions to sustain output and commitment to cooperate and protect the market from significant damages were needed.
He, however, advised that government should redesign or develop national policy to protect jobs and income. This, he said, should be done in collaboration with private sector.