Throughout the current COVID-19 crisis, the international statistics community has continued to work together, in partnership with national statistical offices and systems around the world to ensure that the best quality data and statistics are available to support decision making during and after the crisis. Since the release of the first report on “How COVID-19 is changing the world: a statistical perspective” in May 2020, this second volume updates some of the global and regional trends presented in the former and offers a snapshot of how COVID-19 continues to affect the world today across multiple domains.
Key findings include the loss of the equivalent to 155 million full-time jobs in the first quarter of 2020, increasing to 400 million in the following quarter and the pandemic’s push of an additional 71 to 100 million people into extreme poverty. The report also highlights the impact of the pandemic on specific population groups. Even before the pandemic, women did three times more unpaid domestic and care work than men; since the pandemic, however, data from rapid gender assessment surveys indicate that women in some regions are shouldering the extra burden of an increased workload, particularly in terms of childcare and household chores.
The report also provides a glimpse of the challenges faced by national statistical systems. At a time when reliable information is more essential than ever, many systems are struggling to compile basic statistics, due in part to the pandemic but also because of a lack of resources needed to modernize operations and infrastructures.
This second report was compiled jointly by international organizations, under the aegis of the Committee for the Coordination of Statistical Activities (CCSA).
About the CCSA
The CCSA is comprised of international and supranational organizations, whose mandate includes the provision of international official statistics in the context of the Principles Governing International Statistical Activities and which have a permanent embedded statistical service in their organization and regular contacts with countries. The mandate of the CCSA is to ensure the efficient functioning of the international statistical system; develop common standards, platforms and methodologies; provide inter-institutional support; outreach; and advocacy for high quality official statistics.
