Impact of COVID-19 on lives, livelihoods and MSMEs

Globally, COVID-19 pandemic has put tremendous pressure not only on health care systems but on the socio-economic situation. The crisis has exposed and jeopardized inefficiencies in the countries’ social protection system, food security, trade and financing strategies and Tajikistan is not an exception. Development experts forecast contraction of Tajikistan’s economy up to 2% of GDP which is comparable with a consequence of the civil war in 1990th and of the global financial crisis in 2008–2009. Since the early stages of COVID-19 pandemic, in response to the Prime Minister’s National Action Plan to mitigate the risk of COVID on socio-economic development of Tajikistan, UNDP, along with other UN sister agencies and development partners, has been supporting the Government of Tajikistan, with procurement of critical medical supplies, assessing the longer-term recovery needs and helping the country develop an integrated and inclusive response to the pandemic and its impact on people, economy and environment.