COVID-19 Food Security Response and Recovery Actions in the GMS

COVID-19 represents an ongoing global threat to public health, but it has been especially disruptive to agri-food supply chains and smallholder livelihoods that are dependent upon them. For the GMS sub-region as a whole, COVID-19 has revealed an essential need for more determined commitments to policy coherence, including more extensive and inclusive policy dialogue, harmonized standards, trade facilitation, and market integration. The report gives an overview of the persistent and emerging risks that COVID-19 presents to the agri-food sector. Risks are classified into four salient categories: Supply Chains, Production Systems, Labor Markets, and Demand Patterns. Regional (ASEAN and GMS) perspectives are also covered, including situational assessments of development and health project outputs, such as regional COVID-19 baseline assessment, regional policy responses, regional policy coordination, and regional economic outlook. The final section of the report evaluates the national perspective from each GMS member country, reviewing their individual responses to the COVID-19 pandemic. The national responses are presented in the following areas: (i) logistics, (ii) labor markets, (iii) digitization, (iv) fiscal support, and (v) external market shocks. This section will be most important for GMS countries and for ADB in terms of preparing RCI interventions with adequate responses which are suitable to the situation in various countries.