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Monitoring COVID-19 Impact on Households in Zimbabwe, Report No. 1: Results from a High-Frequency Telephone Survey of Households

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2020-11-19
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2021-01-12
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The COVID-19 (coronavirus) pandemic created an urgent need for timely information to help monitor and mitigate the social and economic impacts of the crisis. This information is essential to inform policy measures for protecting the welfare of Zimbabweans. Responding to this need, the Zimbabwe Statistical Agency (ZIMSTAT), together with the World Bank and UNICEF, designed a high-frequency telephone survey of households to measure the socio-economic impacts of COVID-19 in Zimbabwe. The survey builds on the Poverty, Income, Consumption and Expenditure Surveys (PICES) of 2017 and 2019 and uses a sample of 1747 households from all ten provinces of Zimbabwe. The sample is representative for urban as well as rural areas. This survey is referred to as the Rapid PICES Monitoring Telephone Survey and is funded by the Zimbabwe Reconstruction Fund (ZIMREF), and implemented by ZIMSTAT with technical support from the World Bank and UNICEF. This brief report summarizes the results of the first round of the Rapid PICES, conducted between 6th and 24th July, 2020. The telephone interview lasted for 25 minutes on average and covered topics such as knowledge of COVID and mitigation measures, access to and participation in educational activities during school closures, access to basic necessities, employment dynamics, income losses, food security and assistance received. The plan is to repeat the interviews every 4-6 weeks. Computer Assisted Personal Interviewing (CAPI) was used for data collection.
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World Bank; Zimbabwe National Statistics Agency. 2020. Monitoring COVID-19 Impact on Households in Zimbabwe, Report No. 1: Results from a High-Frequency Telephone Survey of Households. © World Bank. http://hdl.handle.net/10986/35008 License: CC BY 3.0 IGO.
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