UNDP - RIM 2 Full Report - Final - EN

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FULL REPORT
Round 2 - November 2020
Assessment of the COVID-19 Socio-Economic
Impact on Vulnerable Households and
Household Businesses in Viet Nam
February 2021
TABLE OF CONTENTS
LIST OF FIGURES, TABLES AND BOXES.. ................................................................ 4
FOREWORD........................................................................................................ 5
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS....................................................................................... 6
ABBREVIATIONS................................................................................................. 7
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY.. ....................................................................................... 8
1. Introduction.................................................................................................. 17
2. Research questions....................................................................................... 17
3. Methodology................................................................................................. 18
3.1. Survey instruments....................................................................................................... 18
3.2. Sample selection......................................................................................................... 18
3.3. Sample description...................................................................................................... 19
3.4. Classification of households by income and poverty status................................... 22
3.5. Traditional face-to-face vs. phone survey: A comparison...................................... 23
4. Key findings.................................................................................................. 24
4.1. Employment impact of the pandemic is prevalent................................................. 24
4.2. Income impacts of the pandemic: Higher income households were
disproportionately affected...................................................................................... 26
4.3. P overty impacts: A discernible rise in transient poverty between
December 2019 and October 2020.......................................................................... 29
4.4. N on-economic impacts: Difficulties in major household activities were not
widespread, but gender disparities were evident in some activities.................... 30
4.5. Coping measures........................................................................................................ 32
4.5.1. Live safely with COVID-19: The implementation of preventive measures
by households has become less stringent as pandemic-caused health
risk falls.............................................................................................................. 32
4.5.2. Occupational and geographic mobility in response to the pandemic-
caused economic shock: Less than 10% of affected households
reported a move by household members.................................................... 33
4.5.3. Other coping measures.................................................................................... 37
4.6. Support to households: Modest coverage, but generally progressive.................. 42
5. Promoting robust, sustainable and inclusive recovery - recommendations. 45
6. Conclusion.................................................................................................... 49
References........................................................................................................ 50
ANNEX 1. QUESTIONNAIRES............................................................................... 51
A.1. QUANTITATIVE QUESTIONNAIRE OF THE PHONE SURVEY.. .............................. 52
A. Questions to identify interviewees................................................................................ 52
B. Impact ............................................................................................................................ 52
C. Coping measures.......................................................................................................... 54
D. Support............................................................................................................................ 55
E. Other information........................................................................................................... 56
A2. GUIDELINES FOR FACE-TO-FACE INTERVIEWS................................................. 57
Disclaimer: This report, funded and commissioned by UNDP in Viet Nam with the ANNEX 2. KEY FINDINGS OF ANALYSIS OF LABOR FORCE SURVEY.. ...................... 58
support from the Japan’s Supplementary Budget (JSB), is conducted by the Center ANNEX 3. SAMPLE OF FACE-TO-FACE INTERVIEWS.. .............................................. 62
for Analysis and Forecasting, Vietnam Academy of Social Sciences. The opinions,
ANNEX 4. CORRELATES OF HOUSEHOLD’S INCOME REDUCTION BETWEEN
analyses and recommendations contained in this document do not necessarily
OCTOBER 2020 AND DECEMBER 2019: RESULTS OF REGRESSIONS.. ...................... 63
reflect the official opinions of the partner organizations. The report is an independent
publication.
Full report: COVID-19 Socio-economic Impact

on Vulnerable Households and Enterprises in Viet Nam: A Gender-sensitive Assessment 3
LIST OF FIGURES, TABLES AND FOREWORD
BOXES With the aim of helping to inform the Government of Viet Nam’s response and recovery to
COVID-19, a rapid impact monitoring (RIM) of the pandemic commissioned by UNDP and
Figure 1. Distribution of the number of the surveyed households by non-income UN-WOMEN was first conducted in April and May 2020. The first assessment (RIM1) report
characteristics......................................................................................................... 20 “COVID-19 Impact on Vulnerable Households and Enterprises in Viet Nam: A Gender-sensitive
Figure 2. Spatial distribution of the surveyed households............................................... 21 Assessment” provided useful information, especially on the COVID-19 impact on the income
Figure 3. Employment impact (% of households).......................................................... 24 of vulnerable households and enterprises causing a surge in transient income poverty.
Figure 4. Employment impact (any) of the pandemic across various types
As a follow-up to RIM 1, the second round of rapid impact assessment (RIM 2) was conducted
of households (% of households)................................................................................ 25
in November 2020. The objective of RIM 2 is to provide an updated picture on multiple
Figure 5. Distribution of household per capita incomes in October 2020 relative to economic and non-economic dimensions of the well-being of vulnerable households and
December 2019 (%).................................................................................................. 27 enterprises in the pandemic times, focusing on their recovery, as the context in Viet Nam is
Figure 6. Per capita income of affected households in October 2020 relative evolving rapidly.
to December 2019 by key household characteristics (%)............................................. 28
Figure 7. Poverty rates of the affected population by key household Telephone interviews were conducted in November 2020 with 996 households (drawn from
characteristics (%).................................................................................................... 29 the sample of Viet Nam Household Living Standard Survey conducted by GSO in 2018), of
Figure 8. Difficulties in the household activities due to COVID-19 (% of all households)..... 31 which 209 are from ethnic minorities, 205 female-headed households, 196 urban households.
468 households with household business. In terms of sectoral distribution, the sample includes
Figure 9. Gender division of family responsibilities (%)................................................... 31 234 households in agriculture, 115 in manufacturing, 127 in construction, 50 in tourism,
Figure 10. Preventive measures (% of households)....................................................... 32 hotel and catering, and 470 in trade. In addition to phone interviews, the research team
Figure 11. Preventive measures by different population groups (%)............................... 33 also conducted a number of face-to-face unstructured interviews with different types of
Figure 12. Job changes due to COVID-19 from Dec 2019 to Oct 2020 households to gather in-depth information on the ground.
(% of affected households)....................................................................................... 34
The report findings highlight that: (i) Since April 2020, as a result of the pandemic, the
Figure 13. Reasons for not Changing Employment (% of affected households)............... 35
employment of 63% surveyed households were affected (family members were laid off,
Figure 14. Involuntary stay with current work (% of affected households)....................... 36 had a temporary break from work, suffered from reduced working hours and work sharing.
Figure 15. Coping measures - October 2020 (% of affected households)........................ 38 Households with businesses reported a higher percentage of employment impact compared
Figure 16. Savings availability (% households).............................................................. 40 to the average. (ii) While there was a significant recovery from May income levels, household
per capita income in October 2020 was still lower than in December 2019 by 14.5 and 18.5
Figure 17. No savings status by types of households (%)................................................ 40
percentage points for all households and households with businesses respectively. (iii) As a
Figure 18. Spending cut on essential items (% of affected households).......................... 41 result, the transient income poverty rate (using MOLISA’s income poverty line for the period
Figure 19. Spending cut on food and electricity (% of households)................................ 41 from 2016 to 2020) of the affected population that experienced employment impact was
Figure 20. Support delivery (% of households).............................................................. 42 recorded at 12.7% in October 2020 as compared to 4.9% in December 2019. Critically, 8.5%
of the non-poor population in December 2019 fell into poverty in October 2020 because
Figure 21. Assessing Government’s support as effective or very effective
of the impacts of the pandemic. Finally, the implementation of preventive measures by
(% of recipients)....................................................................................................... 43
households became less vigilant as pandemic-related health risks fell, at the same time
Figure 22. Demand for support and public work (% of all households)............................ 45 overall rates of households using e-commerce and e-payment mechanisms as well as
Figure 23. Changes in sectoral real labor income per worker, Q2/2019-Q2/2020 having family members move to new jobs increased.
and Q3/2019-Q3/2020 (%)........................................................................................ 60
We offer the report’s findings and recommendations as inputs to the Government’s continued
Table 1. Quarterly Price Deflators............................................................................... 58 efforts to refine policy actions and their implementation to protect livelihoods of vulnerable
households, support micro/household businesses in recovering their operations and ensuring
Table 2. Sectoral real labor income per worker in quarters 2 and 3: Summary statistics.... 59 continued employment for workers. Ultimately, expanded protection is needed for achieving
Table 3. Locations of face-to-face interviews.............................................................. 62 the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) so that no one is left behind in the ‘new normal’
Table 4. Qualitative survey size (number of interviewees).............................................. 62 of living safely with COVID-19.
Box 1. Significant recovery........................................................................................ 26

Box 2. Obstacles to occupational and geographic mobility: Lack of job information,
information about what skills enterprises are demanding............................................. 36
Box 3. Drastically cut spending.................................................................................. 37
Box 4. Using savings, around 1 to 3 months.................................................................. 39 Caitlin Wiesen
Box 5. Support is quite effective................................................................................. 42 UNDP Resident Representative
Box 6. No government support is required................................................................... 44
Box 7. Quarterly Price Deflators.................................................................................. 58

4 on Vulnerable Households and Enterprises in Viet Nam: A Gender-sensitive Assessment 5
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ABBREVIATIONS
This report was prepared by a team led by Nguyen Thi Thu Phuong (Centre for Analysis and CAF: Centre for Analysis and Forecasting
Forecasting, Viet Nam Academy of Social Sciences - CAF/VASS) and comprised of Nguyen GDP: Gross Domestic Product
Thi Quyen, Nguyen Thi Phuong Nga, Tran Thi Lan Anh and Hoang Duc Hung. Substantive GSO: General Statistical Office
inputs were received from Vu Hoang Dat and Pham Minh Thai (CAF/VASS). Administrative
LFS: Labor Force Survey
support was provided by Hoang Thanh Tu (CAF/VASS).
MA: Moving averages
Throughout the research process, the team received technical guidance from Mr. Nguyen MPI: Multi-dimensional index
Tien Phong (UNDP in Viet Nam) and Mr. Nguyen Thang (CAF/VASS). Special thanks go to Mr. PPE: Personal protective equipment
Doan Huu Minh, Mr. Truong Duc Thang (UNDP in Viet Nam), for their effective support during PPP: Purchasing Power Parity
the implementation of the study. Financial support by UNDP Viet Nam is duly acknowledged.
RIM: Rapid Impact Monitoring
The fieldwork was facilitated by local officers in the provinces of Hanoi, Hoa Binh, Quang UNDP: United Nations Development Program
Binh, Ho Chi Minh, Dong Nai, and Hau Giang. The study could not be completed without UN-WOMEN: United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women
the participation of associations, cooperatives, small and medium enterprises, workers and USD: US dollar
households. The team is grateful to all of them.
VASS: Viet Nam Academy of Social Sciences
VHLSS: Viet Nam Household Living Standard Survey
VND: Viet Nam dong

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY There were 468 households with businesses (HB)1. While such a number of observations is
sufficient for analysis of the whole group of households with HB, care should be taken when
there is a need to disaggregate the results, particularly when the number of observations
per subgroup is under 100 as per our experience.
Rapid Impact Monitoring (RIM) in Brief Figure 1. Spatial distribution of the surveyed households
Since the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic was first recorded in Viet Nam on January 23,
2020, by November 2020, two waves of outbreaks took place in the country. In response,
the Vietnamese authorities took swift action through testing, contact tracing, quarantine
and social distancing measures to curtail the spread and limit community transmission.
Nevertheless, the COVID-19 pandemic has substantially affected the economy and most
vulnerable people and household businesses.
With a view to gathering information that is complementary to mainstream data collected

by the General Statistical Office (GSO), rapid monitoring impact (RIM) - a snapshot - of the
pandemic commissioned by UNDP and UN-WOMEN was first conducted in April and May
2020. This first round of assessment (RIM1) provided useful information, especially on (i) the
COVID-19 impact on the income of vulnerable households and enterprises, causing the
surge in transient income poverty, (ii) the household and enterprise coping strategy during
April 2020 and (iii) signals of early recovery in May 2020.
The second round of RIM (RIM 2) was conducted in November 2020 as a follow up to RIM
1. The objective of RIM 2 is to provide a follow-up snapshot on multiple economic and non-
economic dimensions of the well-being of vulnerable households and enterprises in the
pandemic times, focusing on their recovery, as the context in Vietnam is evolving rapidly.
In addition to phone interviews, the research team also conducted a number of face-
to-face unstructured interviews with different types of households to gather stories on the
ground. Based on findings of an analysis of the survey data, recommendations are made
towards promoting robust, sustainable and inclusive recovery.
Sampling
The designed sample size of the RIM 2 phone survey was 1,000 households. Respondents
were selected from a sampling frame, which consists of 45,838 households of Vietnam
Household Living Standard Survey conducted by GSO in 2018 (VHLSS 2018). For the selection
of the sample, a stratified random sampling was employed. The sample was stratified by
two criteria. Using the first criterion on sectors of employment of household members, the
economy is classified into two groups of two-digits industries - heavily affected sectors,
which are defined as experiencing drops of labor income in real terms of at least twice the
median year-on-year income drop for the whole economy in quarter 2 of 2020, and the
rest. Such information was derived from Labor Force Survey data for the second quarter
of 2019 and 2020. Using the second criterion, households were classified by ethnicity into
two groups - the Kinh-Hoa majority and ethnic minorities. Furthermore, households with a
higher number of members working in heavily affected sectors were oversampled, so were Source: Based on RIM 2 Data
households from ethnic minorities. Sampling weights were then calculated accordingly for
use in different aggregations.
The final sample consists of 996 households, of whom 209 are from ethnic minorities, 205
female-headed households, 196 urban households. In terms of sectoral distribution, there
are 234 households of workers in agriculture, 115 in manufacturing, 127 in construction, 50 1 Household business is defined as per Clause 1, Article 66 of the Government’s Decree 78/2016 /ND-CP as
in tourism, hotel and catering, and 470 in trade. As such, there is a sufficient number of follows: “A business household is owned by an individual or a group of individuals who are Vietnamese of 18 years
observations on single-dimensional analysis, except tourism. The geographical coverage is of age or older, have the full civil capacity, or a household is only registered in one location, employs less than ten
employees and is responsible with all of its assets for the business”. As such, household businesses can employ non-
the whole Viet Nam.
family members, although employees often have family ties with the owner.

Key findings Income declines varied across different types of affected households. Non-poor households
were affected more in relative terms (and therefore also in absolute terms) than poor
households, however income poverty is defined3. Similarly, households in the lowest quintiles
also experienced income decline to a lesser extent than those in higher segments of the
income distribution. A gender difference was negligible, with female-headed households
Employment impact of the pandemic prevailed and varied slightly less affected than their male counterparts. The pattern for households with businesses
was also broadly similar.
across different types of households
A discernible rise in transient income poverty in October

Cummulatively, approximately 12.4% of households report to have members being laid off
since April 2020 (till October 2020) because of the pandemic. The most common impact 2020 as compared to December 2019
of having a temporary break from work experienced by 51.3% of households. 29.3% of
households had members suffering from reduced working hours and work sharing. 63% of
all households experienced least one of these employment impacts of the pandemic and The poverty rate of the affected population increased substantially between December
they are hereafter termed as affected households as opposed to the remaining group of 2019 and October 2020 across poverty lines used and across different segments of the
households that did not report any employment impact. For households with businesses, population. If the MOLISA’s income poverty line for the period from 2106 to 2020 is used,
figures on the percentage of laid off wage workers and reduction of working hours were the poverty rate for the affected population rose from 4.9% in December 2019 to 12.7% in
similar, but those on temporary break from work and any employment impact were higher October 2020. If a World Bank’s poverty line of USD 3.2, 2011 PPP, which is applicable to
than for all households. lower developing countries is used, these figures are slightly higher, at 6.4% and 15.1% for
these two points in time respectively. It is also found that 8.5% and 8.9% of the non-poor
Whichever poverty measurement is used. Across sectors, construction and tourism, catering households in December 2019 falls into poverty in October 2020 if MOLISA and World Bank’s
and accommodation had a significantly higher percentage of households experienced poverty lines are used respectively.
employment impact than the rest. Slightly over half of households engage in agriculture
experienced any employment impact. With regards to households with businesses, although
Non-economic impacts: Difficulties in major household
the concrete percentages were different from those for all households, the pattern of the
within-group differences was generally similar. activities were not widespread, but gender disparities were
evident in some activities
Income recovery from the peak of the pandemic in April

2020 was significant while the pandemic disproportionately COVID-19 caused difficulties in family activities for a small group of households in Oct
2020. Specifically, the percentages of households reported to have had difficulties were
affected households with household businesses
respectively were 5.4% in daily shopping, 3.9% in taking care of the education of children,
4.3% in health care. 2.3% reported conflict in the family and 0.6% reported domestic violence.
On average, household per capita income in October 2020 was equal to 85.5% and 81.5% A considerably higher percentage of female-headed households reported more difficulties
of that in December 20192 for all households and those with household business respectively. associated with doing daily shopping and taking care of health care for family members
These represent a drop of 14.5 and 18.5 percentage points from the pre-pandemic time than male-headed-households, 9.0% vs.4.4% and 6.8% vs. 3.5% respectively.
respectively. These, however, represent a significant recovery from the April income level,
when RIM 1 was conducted. Then the average income drop was as high as by approximately
Live safely with COVID-19: The implementation of preventive
50%.
measures by households has become less stringent
For households with businesses, per capita income in October 2020 relative to that in December as the pandemic-caused health risk falls, while digital
2019 was 82.5% and 78.7% on average for all households and affected households in this transformation has accelerated
group respectively. This indicates that on average, households with businesses experienced
larger declines in relative terms than those without household business, although, in absolute
terms, per capita income of the former was consistently higher than that of the latter in both The percentage of households using masks, soap, hand santiziers for hand wash, temperature
December 2019 and October 2020 (VND 3.2 and 2.4 million vs 2.7 and 2.3 million respectively). check has reduced from April to October 2020. 95% of households wore masks, and 82%
washed hands with soap and hand sanitizers in the previous survey round in April 2020. In
October 2020, these percentages reduced to approximately 79% and 73% respectively.
Such a reduction was explained by respondents seeing the significant drop of pandemic-
related health risk between these two points in time.
The percentage of households using electronic payment increased to 10.1% of households

in October 2020, from 6.9% in April 2020. 13% of households did online shopping in
2 This comparison does not take into account seasonal factors which often result in higher incomes of workers in
December (high season) than in October (low or normal season) and therefore these estimates tend to overstate
the income reduction caused by the pandemic.
3 The income poverty status of households (poor, near poor and non-poor) is in December 2019, i.e. the pre-
pandemic time. This classification is used throughout analyses, unless stated otherwise
October 2020 as compared to 7.6% of households did so in April 2020. Such changes are Cutting expenditures was the most common passive
encouraging, indicating Viet Nam is turning challenges into opportunities for accelerating response employed by affected households
digital transformation.
There are differences in employing preventive measures across different types of households. 45.4% of affected households cut expenditures, of whom 27.4% reduced spending by as
If differences in wearing face masks between different groups were not so large, they were much as more than 30%. On a positive note, only a minuscule percentage of households,
significant with regards washing hand with soap and hand sanitizers, electronic shopping which is estimated at 1.1%, sold valuable assets to cope. A third of affected households
and electronic payment. There is a common pattern for these measures: fewer households relied on borrowing to minimize the spending cut. 8.4% used their savings. Almost half of the
from more disadvantaged groups (poor and near-poor, bottom income quintile) take households did not have any savings at all, while slightly more than a quarter of households
preventive measures as compared to the rest, indicating that economic inequality may had savings to be drawn for between 1 and 3 months.
result in inequality in effective response to the pandemic, particularly with regards to more
expensive preventive measures. The above figures indicate substantial recovery as compared to late April and early May
2020: RIM 1 found that 70% of households reported to have cut household expenses, of
whom approximately 44.3% of households reported cutting more than 30% of household
Occupational and geographic mobility in response to expenses. 74 % of households had to use their savings to partially make up for the income
the pandemic-caused economic shock: Slightly over 10% shortfall.
of affected households reported a move by household
members Support to households: Modest coverage, but generally
progressive
11.3% of affected households in RIM 2 reported to have members who changed jobs due
to COVID-19 since the pandemic broke out in Vietnam. This figure was 4.7% in RIM 1 survey
conducted in April and May 2020. This increase can be explained by the time needed for 17.5% of households received some form of support. The support coverage was modest as
affected workers and households to react to the pandemic’s continued impact on their compared to the percentage of households affected by the pandemic (63.3%)4. However,
employment. it is generally progressive, as higher percentages of disadvantaged households received
the support than their peers in various types of household classifications. The only exception
Furthermore, nationwide lockdown took place in April 2020, labor occupational and is a smaller percentage of female-headed households receiving support than male-headed
geographic mobility was limited, if at all. Of those household members who moved, 92.6% ones.
did it within the same province, and 64.9% within the same occupation.
Among those receiving support, 75.4% of them receive policy support from the Government.
Another 18.8% of them have support from local social organizations. A tiny percentage of
Waiting for the pandemic to end was the most common affected households received support from relatives while support from other sources was
limited in terms of coverage.
reason for the “no move” reaction, followed by skills
mismatch and skills shortage
Recipients generally had a positive view on the
Government support, but assessment varied across different
Waiting for the pandemic to end shortly was the most common reason, being cited by
36.2% of households without moving members. This reason was further elaborated: 24.7% types of households
of affected households thought that they did not expect that temporary jobs had been
available during the pandemic and therefore they had to wait. This may be partly linked to
the lack of information on job availability. Under 15% of affected households had resources 86.7% of recipients had a positive view of the Government support, of whom 22.5% of
to rely on while waiting, of whom 12% could rely on their savings while 1.8% thought that they households appreciating it as very effective. The assessment varied across different groups
could receive unemployment benefits or policy support. of support recipients. Higher proportion of non-poor households had a positive view on the
Government support than poor households. So did households in the top income quintile
The mismatch of supply of and demand for skills, and/or skill shortage was the second as compared to those in the bottom quintile. With regard to non-income classifications of
common reason for the “no move choice” cited by approximately a third of affected households, higher percentage of rural recipients was of positive view than urban ones.
households without members changing employment: 20.6% - no skills for other jobs, 8.5% - So was ethnic minority than Kinh majority, female-headed than male headed recipient
have looked for, but found no relevant recruitment and 3.6% - applied for new jobs but did households and those with head in formal employment vs. in informal employment.
not meet requirements.
In answering to the question “Does your household really need support if the COVID19
The “no move” response to Covid-19 employment impact varied across different types of pandemic breaks out again?”, 54.8% said “Yes”. Put it differently, 45.2% of households did
households, but a general pattern is that it was higher for more disadvantaged groups of not need the public support, or in other words, they could weather the shock themselves,
households (bottom income quintiles, poor households, rural, ethnic minority households, which is encouraging. Across different types of households, a common pattern was that
etc.). The percentage of affected households reported not moving was higher for male- a larger proportion of more disadvantaged groups needed the support as compared to
headed households vis-a-vis female-headed ones. their peers.
4 It is smaller than the percentage of affected households that had to cut expenditures (63.3%*45.4%=28.7%),
but is slightly greater than the percentage of affected households that had to cut expenditures by over 30%
(63.3%*27.4%=17.3%)

Promoting robust, sustainable and inclusive The Government of Viet Nam is determined to accelerate digital transformation,
as evident by its prominent place in the 2021-2030 socio-economic development
recovery - recommendations: strategy. As part of this process, digital technologies should be leveraged to support
the upskilling and reskilling program. In particular, digital platforms, including YouTube
1. Crushing the curve. Viet Nam has up until now emerged among one of the very or others should be used and/or developed to deliver training in skills required in
few countries which were able to maintain a very positive scorecard: a few waves of growing sectors to a large number of workers, including those from the informal sector.
community transmissions, improvements in the Government and public responses from As these Internet-based training programs can be considered as “public goods” with
wave to wave, resulting in smaller and shorter disruptions to economic activities. Since large spillovers and social benefits, the Government can provide monetary incentives
the pandemic broke out in February 2020, Viet Nam has considerably strengthened to owners of the training content, based on the number of hits. Such ex-post financial
testing capacity, contact tracing, stockpiled PPEs and added extra health facilities. rewards resemble the incentives provided by digital marketing firms to owners of digital
To crush the curve, the Government has consistently employed a strategy of rapid platforms which are very common in the digital age. Information on the availability
response, which consists of 5 steps: prevention, detection, isolation, zoning for and usefulness of these and other digital platforms-based programs should reach out
epidemic suppression and effective treatment. The Government has recently modified to as many workers as possible, e.g. through TV, Facebook, Zalo, etc. Digital technology
its strategy to include new elements such as random testing at high-risk places and also helps to speed up payments under the unemployment insurance program, which
people such as hospitals, restaurants, airports, truck drivers; regular monitoring of is critical in challenging times.
coughs/pneumonia cases, maintain strict control/application of quarantine rules in
both establishments and at home. The Government has also embarked on a plan 4. Promoting saving. People, including the poor and the low income, can benefit from
to vaccinate the population as much and as fast as possible. The public has a lot saving to smooth consumption when income is uneven and unpredictable, and to
of trust in the Government, thus showing vigilance by following the guidelines by the insure against emergencies, thus increasing the resilience of the savers. However, as
Ministry of Health, which can be summarized as “Masks - Disinfection - Distance - Crowd found in RIM 2 survey, almost half of households did not have any savings at all, thus
avoidance - Medical declaration”5. having no financial buffer to cushion income shocks.
These are key factors behind Viet Nam’s great success in containing the spread, thereby At the country level, Vietnam’s gross savings rate as a percentage of GNI dropped from
avoiding disruption of economic activities on a large scale. Such a comprehensive 39.5% in 2004 to only 24.5% in 2019, which is lower than the savings rate in lower-middle-
strategy to combat the pandemic should be consistently implemented, updated and income countries at 26% in the same year6. Other measures such as the gross savings
improved based on lessons learnt from wave to wave. as a percentage of GDP or net savings rate as a percentage of GNI also had similar
dynamics over this period. This is a very disturbing trend, as the declining propensity
2. Providing targeted support to hard-hit sectors. The risk of resurgence of the to save contributes to the rising gap between investment and savings, which in turn
pandemic still remains high until a large proportion of the population is vaccinated reduces the country’s resilience and increases its dependence on foreign savings (in the
and/or effective treatments are available. Local lockdowns or location-specific form of foreign borrowings and foreign direct and portfolio investment). It is therefore
restrictions cannot be ruled out. Therefore, while the overall economic recovery is well important to find ways to encourage the saving culture among the population at large,
under-way, it is uneven across sectors. Risks are still high in contact-intensive activities. including the low-income people7.
Economic sectors such as air transportation, tourism and hospitality industry still face
considerable challenges, as documented in both rounds of RIM, and GSO’s labor force Some findings and suggestions drawn from controlled experiments implemented in
surveys. In addition to helping otherwise healthy firms in these sectors to stay afloat, as developing countries are worth considering: (i) Access to low-cost savings accounts
it was already done, the Government can do some targeted interventions to stimulate increases savings and improves measures of individual wellbeing; (ii) Marketing
employment demand in these hard-hit sectors including phasing in the reopening campaigns and account features that try to overcome psychological obstacles
process with vaccine passport, participating in travel bubbles with relevant countries to saving show promise in increasing take-up and use of savings accounts; (iii)
and designing and implementing preventive procedures to receive inbound tourists Technological innovations, including mobile money8 and direct deposit options (e.g.
etc. through traditional top-up of phone card with small cash), have the potential to expand
access to and use of savings accounts9. Most recently, the Prime Minister agreed to
3. Enhancing labor mobility. Geographic and occupational mobility needs to
be improved to accelerate the recovery process while ensuring it is inclusive. As
documented in both rounds of RIM, the lack of information on job availability and 6 Source: https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GNS.ICTR.GN.ZS?locations=VN
skills mismatch are among the main impediments for affected workers to move across
sectors and/or locations to get better employment opportunities. 7 In the early 2000s, as reported by the media then, low-income workers in manufacturing firms frequently used
part of their wages to purchase a few taels of gold (chỉ vàng, which is slightly heavier than a tenth of ounce) and
This structural constraint can be relaxed through reskilling, labor market information and set aside as a form of savings. Such a savings habit may explain why the savings rate was high in the early 2000s.
job matching services, simplification of procedures, including to ensure the continuity This savings culture is very healthy for the economy and individuals alike, and therefore should be nurtured and
of the workers’ participation in the social and unemployment insurances as well as the encouraged. However, gold is a very inefficient, sub-optimal form of savings, to which people resorted to in the
portability of the benefits across space. The education and training curricula should past in the absence of extensive banking services, and in the context of high inflation.
put a stronger emphasis on transferable skills (e.g., critical thinking and problem solving, 8 The number of registered mobile money accounts surpassed one billion in 2019. With 290 live services in 95
soft and digital skills, etc.) that are of great value regardless of sectors or locations of countries and 372 million active accounts, mobile money is becoming the path to financial inclusion in most low-
the workers. income countries (Source: GSMA. 2019. “2019 State of the Industry Report on Mobile Money”. (Source: https://
vnexpress.net/thu-tuong-dong-y-thi-diem-mobile-money-4246011.html).
9 Source: Jessica Goldberg, “Products and policies to promote saving in developing countries: Combine
behavioral insights with good products to increase formal savings in developing countries” (http://wol.iza.org/
5 In Vietnamese, it is the 5Ks rule “5K: Khẩu trang - Khử khuẩn - Khoảng cách - Không tập trung - Khai báo y tế”. articles/products-and-policies-to-promote-saving-in-developingcountries)
These are broader than the 3Ws rule “Wearing masks, washing hands and watching distance” being applied in the
pandemic time in many parts of the world.

pilot mobile money for two years, starting from 9 March 2021. This is a big step forward
for promoting financial inclusion in general and raising savings in particular. 1. INTRODUCTION
• Triggering public work programs when they are badly needed. Public work programs
provide immediate employment and income to the most vulnerable because they are Since the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic was first recorded in Viet Nam on January 23,
self-targeting. UNDP-introduced cash for work in Bac Lieu and Ca Mau are some of the 2020, by November 2020, two waves of outbreaks took place in the country. In response,
examples10. the Vietnamese authorities took swift action through testing, contact tracing, quarantine
and social distancing measures to curtail the spread and limit community transmission.
RIM 2 survey found that 57.4% of respondents had a reservation wage (i.e., the minimum Nevertheless, the COVID-19 pandemic has substantially affected the economy and most
level of wage they require to accept the work) of under VND 120,000 (if they live in vulnerable people and household businesses.
urban areas) or VND 95,000 (if they live in rural areas). The former falls into a lower range
of regional minimum wages for 2021 while the latter is well below the range. This implies With a view to gathering information that is complementary to mainstream data collected
that demand for public work in times of economic downturn is relatively high, while it is by the General Statistical Office (GSO), rapid monitoring impact (RIM) of the pandemic
cost-effective. Programs can be organized by local government agencies that have a commissioned by UNDP and UN-WOMEN was first conducted in April and May 2020. This
backlog of maintenance or small infrastructure work as well as environment restoration first round of assessment (RIM1) provided useful information, especially on (i) the COVID-19
that could be started and completed quickly. Such programs need to be designed and impact on the income of vulnerable households and enterprises, causing the surge in
implemented in a fast and gender-sensitive manner to meet the differentiated needs of transient income poverty, (ii) the household and enterprise coping strategy during April 2020
female and male workers. and (iii) signals of early recovery in May 2020.
• Making social assistance program respond faster and better to large-scale shocks The second round of RIM (RIM 2) was conducted in November 2020 as a follow up to RIM
such as natural disasters, economic crisis and health emergencies like the COVID-19 1. The objective of RIM 2 is to provide an updated picture on multiple dimensions of the
pandemic. Both rounds of RIM found that the Government’s support reached only a well-being of vulnerable households including those with household business, focusing on
limited segment of the population, largely the traditional beneficiaries of the targeting their recovery, as the context is evolving rapidly. On this basis, policy recommendations are
program. The targeting program has so far done well with regards to the “fixed” targets, made to promote robust, sustainable and inclusive recovery in Viet Nam.
as evident by the positive assessment of the support by the recipients as documented
in RIM 2 survey. However, it generally failed to hit the “moving targets”, i.e., unable
2. RESEARCH QUESTIONS
to deliver the support to people in the so-called “missing middle” who are not on
the program’s list, but are hit hard by economic shocks. Although the Government’s
Resolution 42 intended to support numerous groups of informal workers, the lack of
information and the resultant high transaction costs of verification of eligibility of the
spatially and occupationally mobile workers often prevented them from accessing the
RIM 2 seeks to answer the following research questions:
support package. Although the outbreaks of the pandemic became shorter and more
localized from wave to wave thanks to the Government’s improved measures to crush
the curve, and therefore the need for informal workers to access the support declines as ॓ What are the prevalence and magnitude of employment, income and poverty
the economy is recovering, lessons need to be learnt to improve the coverage, speed impacts of the pandemic?
and thereby the effectiveness of the social assistance program in the future. ॓ What are the non-economic impacts of the pandemic on vulnerable households?
To this end, a number of suggestions can be made as follows. First, it is important to ॓ How well did they implement preventive measures to live safely with the
move from a residence-based system of social protection, which excludes Vietnamese pandemic?
migrant workers, to one based on national citizenship. Second, like in other areas, ॓ How do they cope with the pandemic-caused shocks? What are the main
digital technologies would help to substantially cut down transaction costs associated impediments to their effective response?
with eligibility verification and delivery of cash handout to recipients. The latter is a big
challenge during times of lockdown, and when there is a need to reach out to people in ॓ How is the coverage of the Government’s support package? How do recipients
remote areas in a rapid manner. Accelerating inclusive digital transformation in tandem assess the usefulness of the support?
with the Government’s plan to abolish the resident registration (Ho Khau) in 2021 and ॓ What should be done to promote robust, sustainable and inclusive recovery?
with the recently started pilot of mobile money would mark a turning point in the reform
of the social assistance program in the digital age. It is also worth considering central
government matching grants to provinces with limited financial resources to increase
coverage and accelerate implementation.
10 Source: https://reliefweb.int/report/viet-nam/undp-womens-union-bac-lieu-and-ca-mau-provinces-support-
workers-affected-covid-19

3. METHODOLOGY ॓ Over-sampling ethnic minority households: The probability of an ethnic minority
0.3
household to be selected into the sample is assigned as meanfethnic (3), where
meanfethnic is the share of ethnic minority households in the total number of
households in the sampling frame (i.e. 45,838). Sampling weight for an ethnic
0.3
minority household is the inverse of this number, i.e meanfethnic as opposed to 1
3.1. Survey instruments for a Kinh-Hoa household.
To minimize the possibility of selecting households without a telephone number, those

Similar to RIM 1, RIM 2 employed a combined approach of quantitative and qualitative with one in the sampling frame with being assigned probability to be selected into the
research. The core part of this study is a survey of households by phone, whose data were sample 10 times that of those who do not have a telephone number. Then sampling
used for quantitative analysis. The phone survey, which was conducted in November 2020 weight will be the inverse of this number, i.e. 1/10 for households with a telephone
collected information on multiple issues that were quantitatively analyzed in order to answer number, as opposed to 1 for those who do not.
the above research questions. The structured questionnaire used in the phone survey is
given in Annex 1. The phone survey was complemented by qualitative research conducted Then the overall sampling weight of household i is
through a number of field trips where a number of face-to-face unstructured interviews
with different types of households to gather stories on the ground were carried out. The
guiding questions for the face-to face interviews are given in Annex 1. Based on findings of (4)
an analysis of the survey quantitative and qualitative data, recommendations were made
towards promoting robust, sustainable and inclusive recovery.
where xi=1/10 if household i has a telephone number and xi=1 if otherwise
3.2. Sample selection Replacement
In the phone survey, stratified random sampling is employed. The sample is stratified by ॓ Procedure of replacement: The “like by like” principle of replacement will be
two criteria. Using the first criterion on sectors of employment of household members, the followed as closely as possible. This means that an ethnic minority household
economy is classified into two groups of two-digits industries - heavily affected sectors, should be replaced by an ethnic minority household. Then, household with x
which are defined in this study as experiencing labor income drops of at least twice the members working in heavily affected sectors should be replaced by a household
median income drop for the whole economy in quarter 2 of 2020, and the rest. Details on which has y members working in these sectors, for which is smallest.
how incomes of workers are affected at the early stages of the pandemic as revealed ॓ Order of replacement: To ensure that the replacement process is as random as
from an analysis of Labor Force Survey data are provided in Annex 2. Then the number possible, randomly generated integer numbers between 1 and 9,900,000 are
of household’s members working in heavily affected sectors can provide information on assigned to all households in the sampling frame12. This can be called priority
how a household is affected by the pandemic. Using the second criterion, households are number. If there are several candidates that all meet the replacement criteria as
classified by ethnicity into two groups - the Kinh-Hoa majority and ethnic minorities11. specified above, the one with the smallest priority number will be selected.
Therefore, the study team has decided to over-sample these strata as follows: ॓ Sampling weight of the replacing households: Households that replace households
in the official list will receive a sampling weight of the original household. This
requires that enumerators should keep a record of what household is replaced
॓ Over-sampling households with a higher number of members working in heavily by what household.
affected sectors: To this end, in the sampling frame, a variable on the number of
household members working in heavily affected sectors is created. Then each In the case of calculating income and employment aggregates, the final weight is equal
household in the sampling frame is assigned a value equal to (Ni,affected + 1), where to the sampling weight multiplied by household size. This allows accounting for the larger
Ni,affected is the number of members of household i working in heavily affected influence of bigger households on aggregate measures on income and employment.
sectors. 1 is added in order to avoid a breakdown of the selection procedure for
households that do not have any members working in these sectors (i.e. Ni,affected
= 0).
3.3. Sample description
Then (Ni,affected +1)/(Σi Ni,affected+1000) (1) is the probability of a household to be selected
into the sample for household i using this criterion. In (1), one can drop the denominator, This impact monitoring exercise aims to look beyond the averages and places a strong
because it is common for all households. To adjust for this sampling property, each of emphasis on the vulnerable households - how they were impacted and recovered in the
the selected households will be assigned a sampling weight, which is the inverse of this pandemic time. The vulnerable population can be identified by income and non-income
number, i.e. (Σi Ni,affected+1000)/(Ni,affected +1) (2). indicators. The latter are those characteristics of households that are commonly agreed
as strong predictors (or correlates) of vulnerability. These include ethnic minority, migrant,
female-headed households and sectors where the household head worked in 2020. The
11 Preliminary analysis of LFS finds that if a purely random sampling strategy were employed, some strata such
as households with livelihoods in heavily affected sectors may not have a sufficient number of observations in the
sample. So, will by ethnic minority households. Furthermore, the number of ethnic minority households working in 12 We cannot find a way to randomly assign unique and continuous numbers to all households in the sample.
heavily affected sectors may be negligible, thus not suitable for any meaningful quantitative analysis. Meanwhile, Therefore, we assign a random integer number between 1 and 9.900.000 as a way to minimize duplications in
these strata are very important for this study, which focuses on the most vulnerable groups of the society assigned numbers to households.

last household characteristic is identified directly from this phone survey while the others are of households with businesses in sectors other than trade, education, entertainment and
derived from VHLSS 2018 dataset. other services is smaller than 50. For these sub-groups, we normally do not report results of
our calculation or estimation.
Figure 1. Distribution of the number of the surveyed households by non-income characteristics
The sample has the national coverage and therefore is representative at the national level.
The spatial distribution of the survey households is given in Figure 2.
Figure 2. Spatial distribution of the surveyed households
Source: Our calculation based on RIM 2 data
Figure 1 is self-explanatory. It presents distribution by the number of the surveyed households

across different non-income characteristics. In particular, ethnic minorities were over-
sampled, resulting in 209 observations, which is more than sufficient to make a meaningful
analysis. For some groups such as households that have formal jobs or with high dependency
ratios, the number of observations is in excess of 80, which is reasonable. Tourism, hotel and
catering have the smallest number of observations and therefore analysis can be done at
the level of the whole combined group and cannot be disaggregated further (e.g., female
vs. male workers within this combined group)13 .
There were 468 households with businesses14. However, care should be taken when there
is a need to disaggregate the results, particularly when the number of observations per
subgroup is under 100 as per our experience. For example, the number of households with
a household business and also member(s) in formal employment is only 2415, or the number
13 The formula of standard error is SE= , where is standard deviation and n is the sample size (e.g., the number
of observations). The estimates may be reliable if or n is large or both. In the case of the combined sector
of tourism, hotel and catering, the number of observations is relatively small, but in some indicator, for example Source: Based on RIM 2 Data
income and employment impacts of the pandemic, there is not much variation, e.g., all sub-sectors were hit hard.
Therefore, for these combined sectors, estimates on these indicators may be still reliable. Sample description of face-to-face interviews is given in Annex 3.
14 Household business is defined as per Clause 1, Article 66 of the Government’s Decree 78/2016 /ND-CP as
follows: “A business household is owned by an individual or a group of individuals who are Vietnamese of 18 years
of age or older, have the full civil capacity, or a household is only registered in one location, employs less than ten
employees and is responsible with all of its assets for the business”. As such, household businesses can employ non-
family members, although employees often have family ties with the owner.
15 It is quite common that the household head works in a formal firm, but also runs a household business in parallel
to earn extra incomes.

3.4. Classification of households by income and 3.5. Traditional face-to-face vs. phone survey:
poverty status A comparison
The income-based classification commonly splits the whole population into three groups: This study used two main datasets of GSO - Vietnam Household Living Standard Survey
poor, near poor and the rest, or by income quintiles or deciles. There are a number of (VHLSS) and Labor Force Survey (LFS) for the sample selection. The former was used to
thresholds that can be used to group households by the poverty status. Since 2016, Viet construct the sampling frame while the latter was used to identified hard-hit sectors that
Nam has used measures of the multi-dimensional poverty index (MPI) in the official policy were over-sampled.
documents. However, information on non-monetary dimensions of the MPI is not available
from LFS and phone surveys. Therefore, this study uses a classification of poor households The key strengths of these datasets can be summarized as follows:
identified by income as a partial measure of MPI only.
॓ Both are representative as the national and regional levels, LFS is representative
even at the provincial level.
A couple of thresholds will be used to check the robustness of the study findings. The first
threshold is the official poverty line that was applied during the period 2016-2020 was ॓ VHLSS and LFS provide useful detailed information on households and workers
specified in Decision 59/2015/QĐ-TTg issued by the Prime Minister of Vietnam on 19 November respectively. The quality of data is generally seen as high.
2011. According to this document, the income poverty line is 700,000 VND/person/month
in rural areas, 900,000 VND/person/month in urban areas; and the income near-poor line However, these datasets also have some limitations as follows:
of 1,000,000 VND/person/month in rural areas and 1,300,000 VND/person/month in urban
॓ VHLSS and LFS data are collected every two years and every three months
areas. The main drawback of this threshold is that it was set in 2016 and fixed for 5 years from
respectively. The data reported are averaged for the whole year in the case of
2016 to 2020. As such, this poverty line declined in real terms, resulting in an under-estimation
VHLSS and three months in the case of LFS. Consequently, provide no information
of the poverty rate towards the end of 2020.
in the period between two rounds of the surveys. Furthermore, while LFS is of
considerably higher frequency than VHLSS, it does not provide information on
The second threshold is the World Bank’s poverty line of USD 3.2 per person-day in PPP
households
2011 prices, applicable to lower middle-income countries. With the World Bank’s published
conversion factor, this poverty line can be expressed in VND16. The World Bank’s poverty line ॓ The questionnaires used in both surveys are relatively rigid, and consequently
of USD 5.5 per person-day, applicable to upper middle-income countries is also used as the do not provide information on emerging issues of current policy concerns. These
near poor (or vulnerable) lines17. Spatial price deflators (SCOLI) of GSO were used to take into limitations become more pronounced in turbulent times. In particular, in time
account spatial disparities of costs of living. The poverty status of the household is identified of the pandemic, neither VHLSS nor LFS contains information on responses of
based on the income of surveyed households in December 2019, which is considered in this households to pandemic-related shocks.
study as the pre-pandemic time. Using RIM 2 survey data, the poverty rates in December
2019, using MOLISA 2016-20 and World Bank’s USD 3.2, 2011 PPP poverty lines were estimated In this context, complementary surveys need to be implemented. This is the rationale for
at 6.1% and 7.8% respectively. conducting phone surveys under RIM. Phone surveys have a number of advantages vis-à-vis
traditional face-to-face surveys as follows:
This study also employs a commonly used classification of the population into income ॓ can be conducted even in time of lockdowns or limited face-to-face interactions
quintiles. This classification allows us to analyze not only poverty, but also the distributional
impacts of the pandemic. This is important, as the poor population is relatively small, ॓ more cost-effective thanks to zero travel cost and travel time (except field trips
regardless of what income poverty lines are used. The “leaving no one behind” agenda also for group discussions with targeted respondents)
takes into account the missing middle, which is considerably larger than the poor segment ॓ better capture of transient poverty, which becomes increasingly important during
of the population. challenging times
॓ more rapid
॓ more flexible to accommodate most recent burning issues thanks to shorter lead
time
॓ in the case of RIM, the income of households was asked for a specific month
(April and May of 2020 in RIM 1, and October of 2020 in RIM 2). It is therefore
not comparable to income information from LFS and VHLSS, in which incomes
are smoothed by calculating and reporting 3-month and 12-month averages
respectively18
16 The conversion factor is VND 7,454 per USD 1, applicable in 2019 (Source: https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/
PA.NUS.PPP) Then CPI for 2020 of 3.23% (Source: GSO) is used to calculate this conversion factor into 2020 prices,
which is VND 7,694 per USD 1. According, the World Bank USD 3.2 poverty line is VND 738,624, which is in between
MOLISA 2016-2020 urban and rural poverty lines. The World Bank’s is 1,269,510, which is also in between the MOLISA
2016-2020 near poor urban and rural lines.
18 Averaging (or more commonly used moving averages - MA) is a data smoothing technique that statisticians
17 This line is also referred to as the economic security line, and those people with income above this line are often employ to produce more stable (smoother) estimates, as data collected at various consecutive points in time
termed as economically secure people. often have a “ups and downs” pattern, and fluctuations of the point estimates are often considerable.

At the same time, phone surveys have a number of limitations, including:
At the same time, phone surveys have a number of limitations, including: These numbers are at the household level complement GSO’s report on the impact of
॓ they can rarely last more than 30 minutes
the pandemic on workers. According to GSO, as of September 2020, there are 31.8 million
॓ they can rarely last more than 30 minutes
॓ response rate is considerably lower than in face-to-face surveys, resulting in a people20 aged 15 and over that were negatively affected by the Covid-19 pandemic,
॓ higher
response rate isofconsiderably
degree lower caused
sampling errors than in face-to-face
by replacements,surveys,however
resulting good
in a including those who lost their jobs, had to take time off work, and reduce working hours,
higher degree
sampling of sampling
frame and samplingerrors caused
strategy are by replacements, however good income reduction etc.21.
sampling frame and sampling strategy are
॓ larger non-sampling errors than in face-to-face surveys because shorter interview
Figure
Figure4.4.Employment
Employmentimpact
impact (any)
(any) of
of the
the pandemic
pandemic across
across various
various types
types of households (% of households)
॓ timelarger non-sampling
and lower level errors than
of trust in face-to-face
caused by the lacksurveys because shorter
of face-to-face interview
contact.
time and lower level of trust caused by the lack of face-to-face contact.
In summary, traditional face-to-face and phone surveys are not fully comparable. However,
In summary, All households Households with HB
each of themtraditional
has its ownface-to-face and phone
value. Therefore, surveys
they should beare notinfully
used comparable. However,
a complementary manner,
each of them has its own value. Therefore, they should be
bearing in mind strengths and weaknesses of each type of surveys. used in a complementary manner,
All 69.0
bearing in mind strengths and weaknesses of each type of surveys. All 63.3
By quin�le
By quin�le 64.8
Bo�om quin�le
Bo�om quin�le 57.1
Quintile 2 70.7
4.
4. KEY
KEY FINDINGS
Quintile 2 64.7
Quintile 3 78.9
FINDINGS
Quintile 3 72.9
Quintile 4 63.6
Quintile 4 58.9
Qui�nle 5 74.4
Qui�nle 5 62.5
By MOLISA lines 2016-20
Poor 56.7
Poor 46.5
Near-poor 77.6
Near-poor 67.5
4.1.
4.1. Employment
Employment impact of the
the pandemic
pandemic isis
Non-poor 71.0
Non-poor 64.2
impact of
By WB PPP lines
By WB PPP lines 60.9
Poor
prevalent
Poor 47.6
Near-poor 71.3
prevalent
Near-poor 64.1
Non-poor 71.2
Non-poor 64.7
By loca�on
By loca�on
Rural 71.7
Rural 64.4
Urban 64.2
Urban
Accumulatively, approximately 12.4% of households report to have members being laid off
Accumulatively, approximately 12.4% of households report to have members being laid off By ethnicity
60.4
By ethnicity
Ethnic minori�es 70.7
since
since April 2020 becauseof
April 2020 because ofthe
thepandemic.
pandemic. The most common
The most commonimpactimpactof ofhaving
havingaatemporary
temporary Ethnic minori�es
Kinh-Hoa
59.5
Kinh-Hoa 68.9
63.9
break from work experienced by 51.3% of households. 29.3% of households
break from work experienced by 51.3% of households. 29.3% of households had members had members By formality
By formality
Informal jobs 70.0
suffering
suffering from reduced working hours and work sharing. 63.3% of all households suffered atat
from reduced working hours and work sharing. 63.3% of all households suffered Informal jobs
Formal jobs
63.8
59.9
Formal jobs 53.4
least
leastone
oneofofthese
theseemployment
employment impacts
impacts ofof the pandemic and and they
theyarearehereafter
hereaftertermed termedas
as
By gender
By gender
the pandemic Female-headed 62.2
Female-headed 60.4
affected households as opposed to the remaining group of households
affected households as opposed to the remaining group of households that did not reportthat did not report Male-headed 63.6
Male-headed
By sector
71.0
any
anyemployment
employment impact.
impact. For
For households
households with businesses, figures
with businesses, figures on on the
the percentage
percentageofof By sector
Manufacturing 70.7
Manufacturing 81.5
laid-off wage workers and reduction of working hours were similar, but
laid-off wage workers and reduction of working hours were similar, but those on those ontemporary
temporary Construc�on 85.3
Construc�on
Agriculture 57.4
87.7
breaks from work and any employment impact were higher than for all households. Overall,
Agriculture 51.4
breaks from work and any employment impact were higher than for all households. Overall, Tourism, hotel, restaurant 82.1
Tourism, hotel, restaurant 86.1
69% of households with businesses suffered at least one of the listed employment impacts,
Trading, edu., entert., other 64.1
69% of households with businesses suffered at least one of the listed employment impacts, Trading, edu., entert., other 59.4
asasopposed
opposedto to62%
62%for
forhouseholds
households without
without household business (Figure
household business (Figure3) 3)1919. . - 50.0 100.0 - 20.0 40.0 60.0 80.0 100.0
Figure
Figure 3.
3. Employment
Employment impact (% of
of households)
households)

80.0 69.0
70.0 63.3
58.4 Looking beyond the averages (Figure 4), the percentage of poor households22 experiencing
60.0 51.3
any employment impact appears to be smaller than non-poor households, however poverty
50.0
is defined. Across income quintiles, the pattern is slightly different, with more households
40.0 29.3 28.0 in the middle experiencing the specified employment impacts of the pandemic. Such
30.0
12.4 11.4
patterns of impacts appear to be linked to sectors of employment that household members
20.0
are engaged in.
10.0
-
Across sectors, construction and tourism, catering and accommodation had significantly
Laid off waged Temporary break Reduce working Any employment
higher percentage of households experienced employment impact than the rest. Did slightly
workers from work hours and impact
ǁŽƌŬƐŚĂƌŝŶŐ over half of the households engage in agriculture experienced any employment impact.
This is broadly consistent with an analysis of Labor Force Survey data (details are provided
All With HB only in Annex 3). However, a percentage of rural households experienced any employment
Source:
Source: Our
Ourcalculation
calculationbased
basedon
onRIM
RIM2 2data
data
20 Out of 54.6 million workers, i.e., 58.2% workers were affected by the pandemic.
21 Source: GSO. “Report the impact of COVID-19 epidemic on labor and employment in the third quarter of
19 The household head is asked “Due to the COVID-19 pandemic peak in Apr 2020, has you or any household 2020”, accessed at http://consosukien.vn/bao-cao-tac-dong-cua-dich-covid-19-den-tinh-hinh-lao-dong-viec-
19 The household head is asked “Due to the COVID-19 pandemic peak in Apr 2020, has you or any household
member been laid off, have temporary leave of work, have reduced working hours or work sharing so far?”. This lam-quy-iii-nam-2020.htm
member been laid off, have temporary leave of work, have reduced working hours or work sharing so far?”. This
question is important as it helps to partially address the well-known problem of attribution of economic impact to
question is important as it helps to partially address the well-known problem of attribution of economic impact to 22 The poverty status of households (poor, near poor and non-poor) is in December 2019, i.e., the pre-pandemic
the pandemic vs. other things.
the pandemic vs. other things. time. This classification is used throughout analyses, unless stated otherwise.

23
impact was higher than urban ones (presumably rural workers are increasingly engaged in ItIt isis noteworthy
noteworthy that
that ifif seasonal
seasonal factors
factors are
are taken
taken into into account,
account, the
the income
income drop
drop should
should
non-agricultural activities), so was the Kinh vs. ethnic minority households and informal vs. be considerably smaller. The reason is that December of 2019, which
be considerably smaller. The reason is that December of 2019, which was one month from was one month from
formal households. the Lunar New Year Festival (late January 2020) is the middle of high season
the Lunar New Year Festival (late January 2020) is the middle of high season with increased with increased
income
income earning
earning opportunities
opportunities for for household
household working members while
working members while October
October 2020,
2020, which
which 33
With regard to households with businesses (HB), although the concrete percentages were months from the coming Lunar New Year, is still in
months from the coming Lunar New Year, is still in low season. low season.
different from those for all households, the pattern of within-group differences was generally
similar, except across ethnicity. Specifically, the percentage of households with businesses Furthermore,
Furthermore, the the distribution
distribution ofof household
household per per capita incomes in
capita incomes in October
October 2020
2020 relative
relative to
to
from ethnic minorities suffering from any employment impact was higher than their Kinh December 2019 is heavily skewed to the right (Figure 5)24 This figure shows that the mode
24
December 2019 is heavily skewed to the right (Figure 5) This figure shows that the mode
counterparts. of
of this
this distribution
distribution falls
falls into
into the
the range
range of of 91-100%
91-100% of of the
the December
December 2019, 2019, with
with 51.5%
51.5% and
and
41.2% of all households and affected households (i.e. households experiencing
41.2% of all households and affected households (i.e. households experiencing at least one at least one
of the employment impact) respectively. 31.6% and 37.1% of all
of the employment impact) respectively. 31.6% and 37.1% of all households and affectedhouseholds and affected
4.2. Income impacts of the pandemic: Higher households
householdsexperienced
were equal
experienced an
to 70% of the
an income
income drop
December
drop by
2019
by 30%
30% or
level or
larger (i.e.
or larger
lower).
(i.e. their
The
their incomes
incomes in
distribution of
in October
October2020
households
2020
with
income households were disproportionately were equal to 70% of the December 2019 level or lower). The distribution of households with
businesses has a similar shape, but lower density at the right tail. This means
businesses has a similar shape, but lower density at the right tail. This means that households that households
affected with
with businesses
businesses experienced
experienced largerlarger drops
drops inin relative terms than
relative terms than those
those without.
without.
Figure
Figure 5.
5. Distribution
Distribution of
of household
household per
per capita
capita incomes
incomes in October 2020
in October 2020 relative
relative to
to December
December 2019
2019 (%)
(%)
On average, household per capita income23 in real terms, which already took into account
inflation in October 2020 was equal to 85.5% of that in December 2019, representing a
drop by 14.5 percentage points from the pre-pandemic time. This, however, represents
a significant recovery from the May income level, when RIM 1 was conducted. Then the
All households Households with HB
average income drop was as high as by approximately 50%. 60.0 60.0
51.5
48.8
50.0 50.0
41.2
Box 1. Significant recovery 40.0 40.0
38.7
After the peak of Covid [in Apr 2020], I suffered from slow sales for 2 months. In the first month, 30.0 30.0
the orders were few. In the second month, the orders gradually increased. Towards the end
20.0 10.7
20.0
of the year, my business recovers well, thanks to rising orders for Tet, with a lot of orders 11.1 12.1
10.5 10.11
5 .2
8.99.5 9.7
from supermarkets, and many orders from individuals preparing gifts. My sales increased 10.0 5.85.8
8.0 6.77.3
8.8
4.45.3 5.96.9 10.0 6.26.2 7.48.2 8.4
6.17.1
2.93.9
considerably in December.
- -
Female, selling agricultural products, Quang Binh
All Affected only All Affected only

The manufacturing workshop has only 15-16 workers. Because of lockdown, the workshop
was closed for 1 month in April 2020. The owners still provided salary support for 2 weeks
then. After that, the workshop was back to work normally. There are still a lot of orders, as Source: Our calculation
calculation based
based on
on RIM
RIM 22 data
data
usual. Generally, in the workshop, the workers were not too worried about the pandemic.
The temporary suspension of activities mainly resulted from our compliance with social Forhouseholds
For householdswith withbusinesses,
businesses,per percapita income in October 2020 relative
relativeto
tothat
thatininDecember
December
distancing requirements. Workers doing different tasks in distance from one another, with 2019 was
2019 was 82.5%
82.5% and and 78.7%
78.7% on on average for all households and affected
affected households
households in in this
this
little contact. Thanks to a good reputation, orders keep coming to the workshop. group respectively.
group respectively. This This indicates
indicates that on average, households with businesses
businesses experienced
experienced
largerdeclines
larger declines in in relative
relative terms
terms than those without household business,
business, although
although in in absolute
absolute
Male, 32 years old, manufacturing factory, Dong Nai terms,per
per capita
capita income
income of of the
the former was consistently higher than that
terms, that of
of the
the latter
latter in
in both
both
December2019
December 2019 andand October
October 2020 2020 (VND 3.2 and 2.4 million vs 2.7 and 2.3
2.3 million
million respectively.
respectively.
Variation of
Variation of income
income drops drops across
across different types of affected households
households can can be be seen
seen in in
Figure 6.
Figure 6. For
For the
the whole
whole population
population (i.e., with and without household
household business),
business), non-poor
non-poor
households were
households were affected
affected more more in relative terms (and therefore also in in absolute
absolute terms)
terms) than
than
For affected households, defined as experiencing at least one type of employment impact,
poor households,
poor households, howeverhowever income income poverty is defined. Similarly, households
households in in the
the lowest
lowest
this number was 81.5%, representing 18.5 percentage points drop in income in October
quintiles also
quintiles also experienced
experienced income income decline to a lesser extent than those
those inin higher
higher segments
segments
2020 relative to that in December 2019. The latter figure may better reflect the impact of the
ofthe
of theincome
income distribution.
distribution. Gender
Gender difference is negligible, slightly in favor
favor ofof female-headed
female-headed
pandemic than the former, because the former also includes households that do not report
households. The
households. The pattern
pattern for for households
households with
with businesses
businesses was
was also
also broadly
broadly similar.
similar.
any employment impact and therefore may be well attributed to non-pandemic factors.
This is the reason why in the subsequent parts of the report, we will focus on the group of
affected households, unless stated otherwise.
24 This figure aims to depict the distribution of relative income of October 2020 over December 2019 by deciles.
However, the number
24 This figure aims toof observations
depict for the bottom
the distribution four
of relative decilesofwere
income too small
October 2020 and
overtherefore
December they were
2019 merged
by deciles.
together.
However, the number of observations for the bottom four deciles were too small and therefore they were merged
23 In the calculation of a household’s per capita income at different levels of aggregation, the household’s together.
weight used is equal to the sampling weight multiplied by household size.

26 26 on Vulnerable Households and Enterprises in Viet Nam: A Gender-sensitive Assessment 27
This indicates that what took place in Viet Nam is far from the worst case in terms of degree business: with other things being equal, households with HB experienced larger reduction in
and distribution of the impact of the pandemic. Specifically, the drops in household per per capita real income as compared to those that do not have it, by 4.7 and 5.3 percentage
capita income were not too large (especially if seasonality can be taken into account) points for all households and households reporting any employment impact respectively.
while the poor and low-income people were hit less than the others. This correlation is statistically significant at 10% level.
Figure
Figure 6.
6. Per
Per capita
capita income of affected
income of affected households
households in
in October
October 2020
2020 relative
relative to
to December
December 2019
2019 by
by key
key Sectoral correlates of the reduction in per capita real incomes are not robust: with other things
household characteristics (%)
household characteristics (%) being equal, households with the head working in tourism, accommodation and catering,
and in trade, education, entertainment and other services experienced larger drops in per
capita real incomes by 10.7% and 13.2% respectively, as compared to households with the
All households Households with HB head outside employment. All these findings are consistent with the results of the above
unconditional comparison between categories of households.
All 81.5 All 78.7
By quin�le By quin�le
Bo�om quin�le 92.1 Bo�om quin�le 89.9
4.3. Poverty impacts: A discernible rise in
transient poverty between December 2019 and
Quin�le 2 86.0 Quin�le 2 77.0
October 2020
By MOLISA lines 2016-20 By MOLISA lines 2016-20
Poor 98.5 Poor 95.7
Near-poor 96.2 Near-poor 88.7 Because a nationally representative dataset of VHLSS was used the sampling frame for the
Non-poor 81.8
By WB PPP lines
Non-poor 77.1
RIM 2 survey, with appropriate sampling weight as described in detail in the methodology
By WB PPP lines
Poor 92.8 Poor 94.1
section, one can directly estimate poverty rates at two points in time, December 2019 and
Near-poor 89.8
Near-poor 86.2 October 2020.
Non-poor 81.6
Non-poor 76.6
By loca�on
Rural
By loca�on Figure 7. Poverty rates of the affected population by key household characteristics (%)
81.8
Rural 78.7
Urban 80.7
Urban 78.8
By ethnicity
By ethnicity
MOLISA Poverty Line 2016‐2020 World Bank USD 3.2, PPP 2011 Poverty Line
Kinh-Hoa 80.4
Kinh-Hoa 78.7
By formality All 12.7 All 15.1
By formality 4.9 6.4
Informal jobs 80.6
Informal jobs 78.1
Formal jobs 88.5 By gender By gender
Formal jobs 91.3
By gender
By gender 14.4 19.8
Female-headed 82.8 Female‐headed Female‐headed 6.0
Female-headed 79.5
0.3
Male-headed 81.2
Male-headed 78.6 Male‐headed 12.3 Male‐headed 13.8
6.1 6.5
- 50.0 100.0 150.0
- 20.0 40.0 60.0 80.0 100.0 120.0 By formality By formality
Informal jobs 12.7 Informal jobs 15.4

4.9 6.6
Note: Figures for poor and formal households with businesses (the right-hand side figures) are less reliable Formal jobs 4.6
13.0 Formal jobs 4.6
13.0
because the number of observations on them is too small for these sub-groups, resulting in high standard errors
By ethnicity By ethnicity
Across other household non-monetary characteristics which are commonly considered Ethnic minorities 13.8
22.9 Ethnic minorities 19.6
27.1
as good predictors (or correlates) of household welfare status, the pattern is quite similar
11.1 13.1
in the sense that disadvantaged households suffered from relative income loss to a lesser Kinh‐Hoa 3.4
Kinh‐Hoa 4.2
degree than the rest: rural households were affected less severely than urban peers. So By location By location
were ethnic minorities vs. Kinh majority households, female-headed households vs. male-
16.5
headed ones. The only exception is that households whose head is informal employment Rural 4.7
12.4 Rural 7.5
were hit considerably harder than those whose heads are in formal employment. Urban 13.6 Urban 11.2
5.4 3.3
Econometric analysis which allows identifying the correlates of income reduction keeping ‐ 5.0 10.0 15.0 20.0 25.0 ‐ 5.0 10.0 15.0 20.0 25.0 30.0
other factors unchanged (Annex 4) finds that age of the household head matters: Oct 2020 Dec 2019 Oct 2020 Dec 2019
household with head between 30 and 40 years of age experienced a larger drop in per
capita real income as compared to households with the head older than 70: by 9.9 and Source: Our estimation from RIM 2 survey data
10.8 percentage points for all households and households that reported any employment
impact. These figures were 8.7 and 12.9 percentage points respectively if the age of the Figure 7 shows that the poverty rate of the affected population increased substantially
household head is between 40 and 50. between December 2019 and October 2020 across poverty lines used and across different
Another robust correlate of the reduction in per capita real income is having a household segments of the population. If the MOLISA’s income poverty line for the period from 2106 to

2020 is used, the poverty rate for the affected population25 is estimated at 4.9% and 12.7% Figure 8. Difficulties in the household activities due to COVID-19
Figure 8. Difficulties in the
(%household activities due to COVID-19
for December 2019 and October 2020 respectively. If a World Bank’s poverty line of USD 3.2, of all households)
(% of all households)
2011 PPP is used, these figures are slightly higher, at 6.4% and 15.1% for these two points in
time respectively. The increases in poverty rates are observed across the board. Figure 8. Difficulties in the household activities due to COVID-19
10.0 9.0 (% of all households)
However, the estimates of poverty rates for formal, urban and female-headed households 9.0
are less reliable because the number of observations is too small, resulting in high standard 10.0
8.0 9.0
errors. As a consequence, it is not legitimate to make comparison across different categories 6.8
7.09.0
within the classifications of households. For the same reason, we do not report poverty rates
6.08.0 5.4
for households with businesses. 6.8
5.07.0 4.4 4.3 4.3
3.9 3.8
4.06.0
5.4 3.5
Analysis of RIM 2 survey data finds that 8.5% and 8.9% of non-poor households in December
2019 falls into poverty in October 2020 if MOLISA and World Bank’s poverty lines are used 5.0 4.4 4.3 4.3 2.7
3.0 3.9 3.8 2.3
3.5
respectively. Again, it is not possible to do disaggregated analysis because of a limited 2.0
4.0
number of observations on the movement into poverty. 3.0 1.0 2.7
2.3
1.0 0.6 0.6 0.5 0.5 0.6 0.4
2.0
- 1.0
0.6 0.6 0.5 0.5 0.6 0.4
4.4. Non-economic impacts : Difficulties in 26 1.0 Do daily Taking care ofTaking care of Conflict in the Domestic Other
- shopping children's health for family violence
major household activities were not widespread, Do daily education
Taking care ofmembers
Taking care of Conflict in the Domestic Other
but gender disparities were evident in some shopping children's

All
education
health for
Female-headed
members
family
Male-headed
violence
activities All Female-headedSource:

Male-headed
Our estimation from RIM 2 survey data
Source: Our estimation from RIM 2 survey data
Figure 8 shows that COVID-19 caused difficulties in family activites for a small group of Source: Our estimation from RIM 2 survey data
households in Oct 2020. Specifically, the percentages of households reported to have had Furthermore, female members tend to bear more burden than male ones in taking care of
difficulties were respectively 5.4% in daily shopping, 3.9% in taking care of the education the main family activities (Figure 9). The difference was the largest in doing daily shopping
of children, 4.3% in health care27, and 2.3% reported conflict in the family while domestic which is in charge by female members in 66% of households as opposed to just 11.9% for
violence was almost negligible, at only 0.6%. Gender disparities were evident in terms of male members. For the other two-family activities, education of children and health care
difficulties associated with doing daily shopping and taking care of health care for family of household members, the gender difference was not too large, with approximately 49.8%
members28. and 43.1% of households respectively reported that there was no difference in the role
between male and female members.
F9 division of family responsibilities (%)

Figure 9. Gender
Doing daily shopping 11.9 66.0 22.1

Doing daily shopping 11.9 66.0 22.1
Taking care of members' health 23.0 33.8 43.1

Taking care of members' health 23.0 33.8 43.1
Taking care of children education 16.8 33.5 49.8

Taking care of children education 16.8 33.5 49.8
25 The poverty rate estimated takes into account household size. Household’s overall weight used for aggregation
0% 20% 40% 60% 80% 100%
is equal to sampling weight multiplied by household size. 0% 20% 40% 60% 80% 100%
Male Female No gender difference
26 For numerous non-economic impacts, we do analysis for all households, regardless of whether they suffered
Male Female No gender difference
from any employment impact or not, and household size is not taken into account.
27 These percentages for a sub-group of households which reported to have experienced at least one type of Source: Our estimation from RIM 2 survey data
employment impact were slightly higher, 6.4% in daily shopping, 4.1% in taking care of the education of children, Source: Our estimation from RIM 2 survey data
5.5% in health care. Source: Our estimation from RIM 2 survey data
28 Because these percentages are small, we do not disaggregate them by other dimensions (e.g., poverty status,
location, ethnicity etc.) as the number of observations is too small for specific groups to produce reliable estimates.

Gender disparities also vary across different population groups. Across ethnicity, the shares There are differences in employing preventive measures across different types of households.
of females from the Kinh majority taking the main roles in all the three family activities were If differences in wearing face masks between different groups were not so large, they were
higher than those from ethnic minorities (35.9% vs.18.2%, 36.0% vs. 20.9%, and 69.5% vs. 42.4% significant with regards washing hands with soap and hand sanitizers, electronic shopping
for education, health and shopping respectively). Across locations, the share of females and electronic payment. There is a common pattern for these measures: fewer households
taking the main role in daily shopping was higher in urban areas than in rural areas (73.1% from more disadvantaged groups take preventive measures as compared to the rest,
vs. 63.3%), while responsibility for the other two activities was approximately equally shared). indicating that economic inequality may result in inequality in effective response to the
pandemic, particularly with regards to more expensive preventive measures.
4.5. Coping measures FigureFigure 11. Preventive

11. Preventive measures
measures bybydifferent
different population
population groups
groups(%)(%)
4.5.1. Live safely with COVID-19: The implementation of preventive measures by 100.0
households has become less stringent as pandemic-caused health risk falls 90.0
80.0
The percentage of households using masks, soap, hand santiziers for hand wash, temperature 70.0
60.0
check have been reduced from April to October 2020. 95% of household wore masks, and 50.0
82% washed hands with soap and hand sanitizers in the previous survey round in April 2020. 40.0
In October 2020, these percentages reduced to approximately 79% and 73% respectively 30.0
(Figure 10). Such a reduction can be easily understood, as health risk dropped significantly 20.0
between these two points in time. Furthermore, for some measures these percentages 10.0
are higher among affected households: 83% and 75% with regards to wearing masks and -
By quin�le
Ethnic minori�es
All
Formal jobs
Poor
Poor
Male-headed
By loca�on
Female-headed
Non-poor
Non-poor
By ethnicity
Near-poor
Near-poor
Urban
By formality
Informal jobs
By WB PPP lines
By gender
Kinh-Hoa
Rural
Quin�le 2
Quin�le 3
Quin�le 4
Quin�le 5
Bo�om quin�le
washing hands. 34% of affected households had to cancel meetings as opposed to 28%
overall. Analysis of data found that of those who did not take any preventative measures,
only 1.3% could not afford them, and 3.2% did not know.
The percentage of households using electronic payment increased to 10.1% of households

in October 2020, from 6.9% in April 2020. Such a change is encouraging, indicating Viet
Nam is turning challenges into opportunities for accelerating digital transformation. 13% of
households did online shopping. There is a small difference between the affected households
and the rest.
Mask Wash hand with soap and hand-san.
Figure10.
Figure 10.Preventive
Preventive measures
measures (%
(% of
of households)
households) Cancelling mee�ngs
Temperature check
10.3 Electronic shopping Electronic
Source:payment
Our estimation from RIM 2 survey data
Electronic payment 10.1
Electronic shopping 12.9
12.7 Source: Our estimation from RIM 2 survey data
92.0 Note: Estimates on measures other than wearing masks and washing hands with soap and hand sanitizer for
Anymeasure 92.0 poor households are less reliable because of small number of observations
Other 4.1
5.5 4.5.2. Occupational and geographic mobility in response to the pandemic-caused
33.9 economic shock: Less than 10% of affected households reported a move by household
Cancelling mee�ngs
28.4 members
Temperature check 19.2
20.2 The pandemic affects different sectors and regions differently. So does the recovery process
74.5 take place. Therefore, the flexibility of the labor market matters. In particular, labor mobility -
Wash hand with soap and hand-san. 73.3 the ease of movement of workers across occupations (i.e., sectors) and locations in response
Mask 83.1 to the pandemic helps to reduce its negative impacts.
79.3
This is an issue of interest to this study. In the RIM 2 survey, respondents were asked if the
- 20.0 40.0 60.0 80.0 100.0
employment of any member in their household has been affected by the pandemic since
Aﬀected households All early 2020, and if yes, did the affected members change their jobs. Analysis of RIM 2 data
finds that 11.3% of affected households reported to have members who changed job due
Source: Our calculation based from RIM 2 survey data
to COVID-19 since the pandemic broke out in Vietnam. This figure was 4.7% in RIM 1 survey
conducted in April and May 2020. It is easily understood, as the time horizon covered by this
question is longer in RIM 2, while it took time for affected workers and households to respond.
Furthermore, nationwide lockdown took place in April 2020, then labor occupational and
geographic mobility was limited, if at all.

Figure 12. Job changes due to COVID-19 from Dec 2019 to Oct 2020 (% of affected households)
100.0 92.6
Figure 12. Job changes due to COVID-19 from Dec 2019 to Oct 2020 (% of affected households)
90.0 due to COVID-19 from Dec 2019 to Oct 2020 (% of affected households)
Figure 12. Job changes
It would be useful to know why there were affected households who did not do occupational
and geographic
It would be useful to mobility
know why to there
lessenwere
the affected
negativehouseholds
economicwho impacts
did notofdothe pandemic.
occupational
80.0 Figure 13 shows that waiting for the pandemic to end shortly is the most common reason,
100.0 92.6 and geographic mobility to lessen the negative economic impacts of the pandemic.
70.0 64.9 being cited by 36.2% of households. This reason was further elaborated:
Figure 13 shows that waiting for the pandemic to end shortly is the most common reason, 24.7% of affected
90.0 households
being citedthoughtby 36.2% that
of they did not expect
households. thatwas
This reason temporary
further jobs had been
elaborated: available
24.7% during
of affected
60.0 the pandemic and therefore they had to wait. In other words, approximately a quarter of
80.0 households thought that they did not expect that temporary jobs had been available during
50.0
70.0 64.9 affected
the pandemic households had no they
and therefore choice hadbut
to to wait.
wait. Underwords,
In other 15% of affected households
approximately a quarterhad of
resources
affected to rely on while
households had waiting,
no choice of whom
but to12% could
wait. rely on
Under 15%their savings while
of affected 1.8% thought
households had
40.0
60.0 that they could
resources to relyreceive
on whileunemployment
waiting, of whom benefits or policy
12% could support.
rely on their savings while 1.8% thought
30.0
50.0 that they could receive unemployment benefits or policy support.
40.0
The mismatch of supply of and demand for skills was the second common reason cited
20.0 11.3 by
Theapproximately
mismatch of supply a third of affected
and demand households
for skillswithout
was the members
second changing employment:
common reason cited
30.0
10.0 20.6% - no skills for other
by approximately a thirdjobs, 8.5% - have
of affected looked for,
households but found
without membersno relevant
changing recruitment
employment: and
20.0 3.6%
20.6% - applied
- no skillsfor
fornew
otherjobs but
jobs, 8.5%did- not meet
have requirements.
looked for, but found Thisnois arelevant
more structural
recruitmentproblem
and
- 11.3
that
3.6%needs
- appliedto be addressed
for new jobs but todid
improve
not meetlabor mobility and
requirements. Thisadaptation of workers
is a more structural to the
problem
10.0 Share of job Change job Move within that needschanging
frequently to be addressed
conditions toinimprove
the laborlabor mobility
market 29
. and adaptation of workers to the
- changes within the the same frequently changing conditions in the labor market29.
Share of job Change province
job occupation
Move within Figure 14. Involuntary stay with current work (% of affected households)
changes within the the same Figure 14. Involuntary stay with current work (% of affected households)
province occupation
100.0 90.7
Source:
Source: Our estimation
Our estimation from from
RIM 2RIM 2 survey
survey data data 83.6
90.0 80.4 79.5
77.5
80.0 73.0 71.2 72.7
Across different population groups, analysis of RIM 2 data found little difference between 70.0 65.3 65.8 61.4 61.7 64.3
68.1 67.6
58.8 60.8 60.3
urban and rural households, with 12.3% and 10.9% of respondents reporting changes in 60.0 56.6
57.0
49.1
respectively. For other classifications, we do not report differences, because the number of 50.0 44.6
observations for respective categories is too low. Of those who moved, 92.6% did it within the 40.0
same province, and 64.9% within the same occupation. The former fact - the dominance 30.0
of within-province mobility may be explained by a stylized fact that economic growth in 20.0
recent years has become more balanced geographically thanks to substantially improved 10.0
connective infrastructures in many parts of the country. 0.0
Figure
Figure13.
13. Reasons fornot
Reasons for notChanging
Changing Employment
Employment (% (% of affected
of affected households)
households)
Figure 13. Reasons for not Changing Employment (% of affected households)
17.1
17.1
3.6 3.6 36.2 36.2

Source:
Source: Our
Our estimation
estimationfrom
fromRIM
RIM22survey
surveydata
data
8.5 8.5
If the three reasons (i) can rely on savings;(ii) can expect to get unemployment benefits and
If the three reasons (i) can rely on savings;(ii) can expect to get unemployment benefits and
8.0 8.0 (iii) feel immoral to quit when the employer was in difficulties are excluded, approximately
(iii) feel immoral to quit when the employer was in difficulties are excluded, approximately
6.0 two-thirds of affected households reported “no move choice”, but to stay with their current
6.0 two-thirds of affected households reported “no move choice”, but to stay with their current
20.6 employment (Figure 14). The status of “no move choice” varies across different types of
20.6 employment (Figure 14). The status of “no move choice” varies across different types of
households, but a general pattern is that it was higher for more disadvantaged groups of
households, but a general pattern is that it was higher for more disadvantaged groups of
households (bottom income quintiles, poor households, rural, ethnic minority households
Anticipate the pandemic ending shortly households (bottom income quintiles, poor households, rural, ethnic minority households
Anticipate
Hesitancy thewhen
to quit pandemic ending
employer shortly
is difficulties etc.). The exception was that the percentage of affected households who could not move
etc.). The exception was that the percentage of affected households who could not move
Hesitancy to quit
No skills for other jobs when employer is difficulties was
washigher
higher for
for male-headed
male-headed households vis-a-vis female-headed
households vis-a-vis female-headed ones.
ones.
Nohousehold
Have skills for other jobs to move to new jobs
difficulties
Have
Have household
looked for, but difficulties to move
found no relevant to new jobs
recruitment
Have for
Applied looked for, but did
new jobs found
not no relevant
meet recruitment
requirements
Others
Applied for new jobs but did not meet requirements
Others
Source: Our estimation from RIM 2 survey data 29
29 InIngeneral,
general,occupational
occupational mobility
mobility isis more
more challenging for workers
challenging for workers with
with highly
highlyspecialized
specializedskills,
skills,as
asoccupation-
occupation-
specific skills can be acquired mostly through “learning by doing”. Therefore, workers should constantly
specific skills can be acquired mostly through “learning by doing”. Therefore, workers should constantly strengthen strengthen
the
theso-called
so-called“transferrable
“transferrable skills”
skills” that
that are
are suitable for many
suitable for many types
types ofof employment
employmentto tohelp
helpthem
themquickly
quicklyadapt
adaptand
and
acquire technical skills through formal and on-the-job training. This can increasingly be done with digital
acquire technical skills through formal and on-the-job training. This can increasingly be done with digital platforms platforms
as
asthe
thecountry
countryisisaccelerating
accelerating digital
digital transformation.
transformation.

If the family reason is further excluded, 57,4% of affected households (equivalently 36,6% of I worked as a manufacturing worker at the age of 17. But after I got married, I left it because
all households) could not take other jobs to lessen the negative impact of the pandemic I couldn’t work overtime, and I needed time to look after my children. I do not know what
for a number of reasons, such as no relevant or temporary jobs were available, or lack of other apprenticeship, so choose to sell lottery tickets. It’s comfortable to have time to look
suitable skills for other jobs. after the baby. Now I don’t know what to do if I change my job.
Female, 32 years old, selling lottery tickets, Ho Chi Minh

Box 2. Obstacles to occupational and geographic mobility: Lack of job information,
information about what skills enterprises are demanding
We are not able to know what new jobs to move to. People are just used to what jobs they Here, people only do farming. In the face of difficulties, young people also struggle to
are doing. We don’t know what else to do here locally. I also do not dare to borrow money change to trading or become workers. It is also difficult for people here to change jobs.
to start a new business, while thinking that if the business went down, I would die due to Trading is difficult, not easy. Local people only harvested rice every year for 2 to 3 hundred
nothing to pay back. “dạ” [a local measure of weight) and then sell it. It is very difficult to switch to a trading
business. Whoever being able to migrate to Saigon has already left for being manufacturing
Female, 38 years old, restaurant, Quang Binh workers. Who cannot go, because they still attached closely to the local soil, to the field,
and their houses, they do not know what else to do.
Male, ethnic minority, 42 years old, agriculture, Hau Giang

I also want to think about what else to do, but I don’t have the capacity to use a computer or a
[smart] phone [to use the Internet]. People know to utilize the Internet [for an apprenticeship,
job information], they can earn more. But not all people are good at the Internet. Earlier I As for lessons learnt for future responses as the pandemic still lingers on, it is important to (i)
said that my family did not know much. We knew a little bit of weaving and cooking, thanks crush the curve by all means possible; (ii) improve information on job availability, making it
to learning from each other locally. But it is easy to learn these local jobs, but other jobs are widely accessible to workers and households; and (iii) strengthen transferable skills for a wide
very hard [to learn]. I found it very hard to change jobs and couldn’t move to another job. range of workers. To this end, the traditional approach should be complemented by digital
technologies and platforms as Vietnam is entering the digital age.
Female, ethnic minority, 42 years old, weaving, cooking, Hoa Binh
4.5.3. Other coping measures
I have not thought about moving to another job. I do not know what job to find, and do not Cutting expenditures was the most common measure employed by affected households
see anyone say what job to do easily.
Figure 15 shows how affected households coped with reduced income in October 2020.
Male, 35 years old, driving, Hoa Binh 45.4% of affected households cut expenditures, of whom 27.4% reduced spending by as
much as more than 30%. On a positive note, only a minuscule percentage of households,
which is estimated at 1.1%, sold valuable assets to cope, which may suggest that they either
Now that it’s difficult to change jobs. Sometimes I say to look for a part-time job, but I just did not have much to sell or were not forced into such a situation.
stop at thinking because the head is also slow. I do not know how. I learned the repair job.
Learning that job was thanks to my brothers. I also did not dare to borrow to build a small
workshop. Do not dare to invest into a business. Box 3. Drastically cut spending
Male, 36 years old, repairing small electrical appliances, Hanoi During the COVID, we do less and spend less, that’s simple. I tried to cope by paying less.
The spending money must be less, more frugal. No more buying, for clothes, or remodeling
something in the house. Previously, I used to a little decoration change before. But now I will
It’s the same difficulty in finding jobs, regardless of males or females. But boys are still easier stop such irregular payments.
to find a job because of their good health. As for me, being a female, I am weak in health,
Female, 34 years old, accommodation service, Hoa Binh
I do not know what job to look for. Maybe growing vegetables, opening a small shop in the
village. Do not know what job to find now. Jobs are difficult, their companies do not expand.
I also know a bit of embroidery but my income from such products is low. I do it as a part-
time job, due to my low income. Reduce the shopping at the local market even once a half a week. Going to the market for
the whole week twice a week. Then a little more stockpile for reduced prices, and less food
Female, ethnic minority, 21 years old, restaurant assistant, Hoa Binh consumption. Reducing food expenses such as on fruits for parents. I only buy fruits for my
small kid. Both the milk and the food for my kid cost 50 thousand VND every day. Previously,
food for the parents cost about a hundred thousand. Now, the parents eat much less, just a
Being over 30-40 years old, I found it difficult to find a job. Possibly, I would just work as a few dozen, in order to reduce as much as possible what the parents eat.
security. But I do not know where to find such job, and what skills are required. Without any
professional qualifications, we do not know what job to find. Female, 28 years old, garment worker, Dong Nai
Male, 40 years old, carrier, Quang Binh

FigureFigure
15. Coping measures
15. Coping - October
measures - October2020
2020 (% of affected
(% of affectedhouseholds)
households) Box 4. Using savings, around 1 to 3 months
Those street vendors, like me, and the housemaids, are two groups that travel much in many
Sell valuable assets 1.4
1.1 markets. Many people are afraid of us due to a higher COVID infection risk. Therefore, they
25.6 do not want to hire us during the pandemic peak. The previous pandemic peak gave us a
Reduce >30% expenses 33.8 lesson that we had to wait until the pandemic peak pass because we could not find other
27.4 jobs. So, I try to save. How much money I earn, I try to spend less and try to save. I earn not
11.7
Reduce 10%-30% expenses 18.3 much, then I can save for consumption in about a half of month, up to a month.
13.1
4. 9 Female, 45 years old, selling lottery tickets, Ho Chi Minh
Reduce < 10% expenses 5. 1
4. 9
11.8 I am working for a manufacturing enterprise. Due to the pandemic, I had a temporary leave
New loans 18.0 from work for about more than 1 month, i.e., 1 month 20 days. After the pandemic peak, the
13.1
7.4 enterprise called me back. Now I work normally as in the past. For the temporary leave, I did
Deferred payment 12.2 not have any money for the month. Then I came back to my hometown and my mom took
8.4
8. 4 care of me. I don’t have much money to save. Most of my earnings are for my food and
Current loan reschedule 9 .6 basic consumption. I earn about 10 million VND per month, and I can save up to 4-5 million
8.7 VND to have money to send home. So that my mom can have some investment or savings.
7.9
Using savings 9.9 So when I don’t have a job, I can come back to my hometown and my mom will take care
8.4 of me, without any problem.
0.0 5.0 10.0 15.0 20.0 25.0 30.0 35.0 40.0 Male, 24 years old, mechanic worker, Dong Nai
Male-headed Female-headed All

Source: Our estimation from RIM 2 survey data Must save. No savings, you cannot live. In the past, I used to go to the market to spend a little
bit more. Since the pandemic, I was afraid that the COVID infection will last for a long time.
A third of affected households relied on borrowing to minimize the spending cut, of whom Then I have to save money. For each 100 thousand VND, I spend about 30 or 40 thousand
13.1% took new loans, 8.7% rescheduled their existing loans and 8.4% used the deferred VND only. In general, I try to go to the market to buy more vegetables than other expensive
payment mode - a form of loans provided by sellers of goods and services. 8.4% used their food and basic things. What I spend, I think twice to save the money. I keep saving money
savings. It should be noted that higher proportions of female-headed households took these because I don’t know how long the pandemic will last. Now my savings is enough for 2
measures than male-headed households, which is consistent across all responses. months of basic consumption.
Although the reduction in living standards of households in October 2020 was considerable, Female, 45 years old, retailer, Hau Giang
the above numbers gave a considerably better picture than what happened to Vietnamese
households at the peak of the pandemic. RIM 1 survey, which was conducted in late April
and early May 2020 found that 70% of surveyed households reported to have cut household
expenses, of whom approximately 44.3% of all households and 47.7% of female-headed My mother in the countryside does not spend much. For vegetables, we go around picking.
households reported cutting more than 30% of household expenses. 74 % of households had We can catch fish on our pond, chickens and ducks in our garden. For the rice, my mother
to use their savings to partly make up for the income shortfall. usually saves 1 ton and 2 tons from the previous crop. So, we can have enough food until
the next crop. So even during the pandemic, everything is normal for my mother. Facing
However, almost half of households did not have any savings (Figure 16) so they had to cut the job leave, I just go back to the hometown with my mom, and it’s fine for a few months.
expenditures and/or borrow. Slightly more than quarter of households have savings to be
Female, 26 years old, garment worker, Ho Chi Minh
drawn for between 1 and 3 months.
My husband and I have been working as workers here [in Ho Chi Minh City] for 5 years. I work
in a garment company. My husband works in a shoe company. Each of us earns about 11 to
14 million VND every month. Renting a house, and food in an expensive city, make us hard to
save. Every month, we spend about 7 million VND, and send 5 million VND to the hometown
for grandparents with 2 children in primary school. However, a little is leftover due to getting
sick, travelling back to the hometown, social events like the death ceremony. We cannot
save much. We encouraged each other to work hard, and we have saved enough for 1-2
months of no work due to COVID and wait for it over. Now the scariest situation is another
pandemic peak, like that in Apr-May 2020, causing no job, but without savings, I have not
figured out how to manage our lives.
Male, 35 years old shoe worker, Ho Chi Minh

Figure 16. Savings availability (% households) Figure18.
Figure 18.Spending
Spendingcut
cuton
onessential
essentialitems
items(%
(%ofofaffected
affectedhouseholds)
households)
Figure 16. Savings availability (% households)
Figure 16. Savings availability (% households) 30.2

4 Food 35.1
7.9 31.3
22.7
4 Electricity 29.9
7.9 24.3
14.2
48.0 4.7
Education expenses 15.0
14.2 6.9
48.0 9.6
Health expenses 10.7
9.9
26.3 1.0
Rental 2.7
1.4
26.3
0.0 5.0 10.0 15.0 20.0 25.0 30.0 35.0 40.0
No savings 1-3 months 4-6 months Up to 1 year More than 1 year Male-headed Female-headed All
No savings 1-3 months 4-6 months Up to 1 year More than 1 year Source:Our
Source: Ourestimation
estimationfrom
fromRIM
RIM22survey
surveydata
data
Source: Our estimation from RIM 2 survey data For food and electricity with a sufficient number of observations on spending cut, it is possible
Figure 17 shows that the savings availability of more disadvantaged households is lower to disaggregate the results by other key household characteristics (Figure 19). Specifically, in
as compared to more advantaged ones, regardless of what classification is used. The percentage terms, more rural households affected by the pandemic cut food expenditures
difference is largest between income poor and non-poor, whatever poverty line is used. than their urban counterparts, so did the bottom two income quintiles than the top two
Figure 17. No savings status by types of households (%) quintiles. However, also in percentage terms, more Kinh households cut food expenditure
Figure 17.
Figure 17.No
Nosavings
savings status by types
status by typesofofhouseholds
households(%)(%) than ethnic minority households, which is not straightforward to be understood. With regard
90.0 to electricity, the pattern is similar across ethnicity and income quintiles, but is opposite
77.6 76.6
80.0
90.0 across urban vs. rural areas.
70.0 63.8 77.6 76.6
80.0
56.4 54.0 53.3 55.5 53.6 Figure
Figure 19.
19. Spending
Spending cut
cut onon food
food and
and electricity
electricity (%(%
ofof households)
households)
60.0
70.048.0 63.8
51.6 50.8 51.2 Figure 19. Spending cut on food and electricity (% of households)
56.4 44.6 46.7
55.5 46.5
50.0
60.0 51.6 54.0 42.9 50.8
53.3 40.1 51.2 53.6
48.0 35.9 44.6 46.7 46.5
40.0
50.0 29.5 42.9 40.1
35.9 27.1 24.3
30.0
40.0 29.5 27.1
Kinh-Hoa All
By quin�le
ƚŚŶŝĐDŝŶŽƌŝƚŝĞƐ
31.3
32.3 Food
Food Kinh-HoaAll
By quin�le
Ethnic minorities 19.8
24.9
Electricity
30.0
20.0 24.0
20.0
10.0 By ethnicity 43.3 Bo�om quin�le
By ethnicity Electricity34.9
Quin�le
Urban 2 26.9 37.4 Quin�le
Urban 2 25.5 30.2
10.0
0.0
Quin�le
Rural 3 26.7 Quin�le
Rural 3 21.3
23.8
0.0 32.9
By MOLISA 2016-202ϬůŝŶĞƐ
gender
lines
All
By quintile
Urban
minorities
formality
Female-headed
Non-poor
jobs
Poor
Non-poor
Poor
quintile
location
jobs
Male-headed
Kinh-Hoa
Rural
ethnicity
Quintile 2
Quintile 3
Quintile 4
Quintile 5
Near-poor
Near-poor
By location 4
Quin�le 30.1 Quin�le 4
By location 22.9
By MOLISA 2016-202ϬůŝŶĞƐ
gender
lines
All
By quintile
Urban
minorities
formality
Female-headed
Non-poor
jobs
Poor
Non-poor
Poor
Bottom quintile
location
jobs
Male-headed
Kinh-Hoa
Rural
ethnicity
Quintile 2
Quintile 3
Quintile 4
Quintile 5
Near-poor
Near-poor
Qui�le 21.3 Qui�le

Quitile 55 10.8
10.8
5 5
Informal
Formal
Quitile 21.3
PPP
By loca�on
Quintile 4 22.9
Informal
Formal
By WB PPP
By loca�on
ByBy
Quintile 4 30.1
Bottom
ByBy
ByBy
23.8
WB
ByBy
QuintileRural
3 21.3
26.7 32.9
Ethnic
QuintileRural
3
Urban 25.5
Ethnic
Quintile 2 30.2
By
Urban
Quintile 2 26.9 37.4
BottomByquintile
ethnicity 34.9
By ethnicity
ŽƚƚŽŵƋƵŝŶƚŝůĞ 43.3 Ethnic
By minori�es
quintile 19.8
By quintile 24.0
Kinh-Hoa
All 24.9
24.3
Kinh-Hoa
All 32.3
31.3
0.0
0.0 10.0 20.0
10.0 20.0 30.0
30.0 40.0
40.0
Source: Our estimation from RIM 2 survey data 0.00.0 20.0
20.0 40.0
40.0 60.0
60.0

Source:Our
Source: Ourestimation
estimationfrom
fromRIM
RIM22survey
surveydata
data
Figure 18 showed was cutting food expenditure was done by 31.3% of affected households
followed by electricity 24.3%, health 9.9%, education 6.9% and rental 1.4 %. These numbers
are comparable to those derived from the May part of RIM 1 survey, but considerably better
than those derived from the April part. This implies that spending on essential items quickly
recovered in part and then stabilized, without further improvements. In terms of gender
disparities, higher proportions of female-headed households did these spending cuts, than
male-headed households.

4.6. Support to households: Modest coverage, Figure 21. Assessing Government’s support as effective or very effective3131 (% of recipients)
Figure 21. Assessing Government’s support as effective or very effective (% of recipients)
but generally progressive All

By quin�le
86.7
Bo�om quin�le 79.5

Figure 20 shows that 17.5% of households received some form of support. The support Quin�le 2 86.2
coverage is modest as compared to the percentage of households affected by the pandemic Quin�le 3 91.4
(63.3%)30. However, it is generally progressive, as higher percentages of disadvantaged Quin�le 4 85.9
households received the support than their peers in various types of household classification. Quin�le 5 93.6
The only exception is a smaller percentage of female-headed households receiving support Poor 77.1
than male-headed ones. Near-poor 80.7
Non-poor 88.2
Among those receiving support, 75.4% of them receive the policy support from the By WB PPP lines
Government. Another 18.8% of them have supports from local social organizations. A tiny Poor 77.4
percentage of affected households received support from relatives while support from Near-poor 81.4
Non-poor 89.8
other sources was limited in terms of coverage. By loca�on
Rural 88.6
Figure
Figure20.
20.Support
Supportdelivery
delivery(%
(%of
ofhouseholds)
households) Urban 79.6
By ethnicity
Received support Type of support received Kinh-Hoa 86.1
By formality
All 17.5 75.4 Informal jobs 86.4
By quin�le Government Resol. 42 85.6 Formal jobs 91.5
Bo�om quin�le 32.7 73.1 By gender
Quin�le 2 14.9 18.8 Female-headed 91.5
Quin�le 3 17.4 Local organiza�ons 14.4
Quin�le 4 10.9 19.8 Male-headed 85.6
Quin�le 5 13.5
Commercial Banks 1.1 0.0 20.0 40.0 60.0 80.0 100.0
Poor 36.9 1.3
Near-poor 29.9
Non-poor 15.3 3.2 Source: Our estimation from RIM 2 survey data
By WB PPP lines Enterprise/Associa�ons
Poor 40.7 4.0
Near-poor 23.3 2.9
Non-poor 14.1 Social protec�on
By loca�on 3.6
Rural 19.1 Box 5. Support is quite effective
Urban 13.3 Family and rela�ves 0.6
By ethnicity 0.7
Ethnic minori�es 24.7 I sell some drinks under the bridge, including coffee, some snacks, and sugarcane juice.
Kinh-Hoa 16.4 5.0
By formality Others I sell from early morning to 4 - 5 pm every day and can get profit from 50 to 60 thousand
19.0 6.2
Informal jobs
VND. I lived alone, so that’s enough for me. I had an accident, so my leg was disabled.
Formal jobs 7.3
By gender 0.0 20.0 40.0 60.0 80.0 100.0 Therefore, each month, I receive the support of 405,000 VND from the government. Due to
Female-headed 15.0 the pandemic, I could not work for a short period. My brothers and sisters in the family also
Male-headed 18.2 Male-headed Female-headed All lovingly brought in some food from time to time. And then the local government also paid
0.0 10.0 20.0 30.0 40.0 50.0 attention to support 20 kg of rice, with 1.5 million VND in cash. I was very happy to receive
the money, spent 500,000 VND on food while staying at home to wait for the pandemic
to pass. With such support, I did not have to go out to the streets for earnings. After the
pandemic peak, with the rest 1 million VND, I bought more things to put it on a trolley to
Those receiving the support highly appreciated the support. Approximately 64.2% of peddle in pubs.
recipients considered the support as effective, and 22.5% as very effective. Thus 86.7% of
recipients had a positive view of the Government support (Figure 21). The assessment varied Female, 55 years old, street vendor, Ho Chi Minh
across different groups of support recipient. A higher proportion of non-poor households had
a positive view on the Government support than poor households. So did households in the
top income quintile as compared to those in the bottom quintile. With regard to non-income
classifications of households, a higher percentage of rural recipients was of a positive view
than the urban one. So was ethnic minority than Kinch majority, female-headed than male-
headed recipient households and those with head in formal employment vs. in informal
employment.
30 It is smaller than the percentage of affected households that had to cut expenditures (63.3%*45.4%=28.7%),
but is slightly greater than the percentage of affected households that had to cut expenditures by over 30% 31 The number of households considering the support as very positive is only sufficient for analysis at the aggregate
(63.3%*27.4%=17.3%) level and therefore we do not present the results at disaggregate level.

Figure 22. Demand for support and public work (% of all households)
93.4% of households reported their trust in the COVID-19 prevention system. This number Figure 22. Demand for support and public work (% of all households)
varied little across different types of households and therefore we do not present it at more
a disaggregated level. Demand for support Demand for public work
In answering to question “Does your household really need support if the COVID19 All 54.8 All 57.4
pandemic breaks out again?”, 54.8% said “Yes”. Put it differently, 45.2% of households do By quintile By quintile
Bottom quintile 70.0 Bottom quintile 63.1
not need the public support, or in other words, they can weather the shock themselves, Quintile 2 59.9 Quintile 2 63.4
which is encouraging. Across different types of households, a common pattern was that a Quintile 3 53.4 Quintile 3 56.6
larger proportion of more disadvantaged groups need the support as compared to their Quintile 4 49.8 Quintile 4 57.5
peers (Figure 22, left panel), which is intuitive. However, in percentage terms, fewer female- Quintile 5 48.1 Quintile 5 60.2
By MOLISA lines 2016-2020 By MOLISA lines 2016-2020
headed households needed the support than their male counterparts. Poor 57.9 Poor 63.8
Near-poor 75.9 Near-poor 72.9
Non-poor 54.3 Non-poor 58.8
By WB PPP lines
Box 6. No government support is needed: Some opinions By WB PPP lines
Poor 70.9
Poor 67.8
Near-poor 71.6 Near-poor 61.9
No, I have not thought about that support from the Government. I just think the State can Non-poor 51.8 Non-poor 58.6
only help people for a while, not forever. So regardless of support or not, now people should By location By location
Rural 57.4
try to learn and to have a job in hand, then it would be fine in any difficulty. Rural 59.1
Urban 57.5
Urban 43.8
By ethnicity By ethnicity
Female, 37 years old, salesman, Hanoi Ethnic minorities 70.5 Ethnic minorities 65.7
Kinh-Hoa 52.5 Kinh-Hoa 56.2
By formality By formality
Informal jobs 55.5 Informal jobs 55.6
Formal jobs 70.3
It is not that the State does not care about people. But the State is still poor. Complaints of no Formal jobs 50.3
By gender
By gender
support are not right with the support policy. Support is needed for only spiritual motivation, Female-headed 50.0 Female-headed 56.6
but not for material reliance. Even with or without COVID peak, I pay attention to work, not Male-headed 56.1 Male-headed 57.7
to support. 0.0 20.0 40.0 60.0 80.0
0.0 20.0 40.0 60.0 80.0
Female, 48 years old, brocade weaving, Hoa Binh
The Government has already cared for people. The Government provides insurance for
poor households and near-poor households. The Government has also supported social
5. Promoting robust, sustainable and inclusive
insurance, health insurance for their free medical examination. Then, when the pandemic recovery - recommendations
came, and they could not come to the hospital, the government gave the doctor’s phone
number to visit those patients. Such support is enough. The Government cannot pay
attention to all of the population. Not enough money to support all of the population. Like ॓ Crushing the curve. Viet Nam has up until now emerged among one of the
other people, I need to try my best a bit more and wait for the pandemic to pass. very few countries which were able to maintain a very positive scorecard: a
few waves of community transmissions, improvements in the Government and
Male, 45 years old, processing agricultural products, Hau Giang public responses from wave to wave, resulting in smaller and shorter disruptions to
economic activities. Since the pandemic broke out in February 2020, Viet Nam has
considerably strengthened testing capacity, contact tracing, stockpiled PPEs and
added extra health facilities. To crush the curve, the Government has consistently
Answering the question “If the pandemic goes on for more than 3 months, are you willing to employed a strategy of rapid response, which consists of 5 steps: prevention,
accept jobs from public work with a specified level of wage (VND 120,000 and 95,000 per detection, isolation, zoning for epidemic suppression and effective treatment.
person-day in urban and rural areas?”, 57.4% of respondents said “Yes” and consequently, The Government has recently modified its strategy to include new elements such
42.6% of households had a reservation wage in excess of the mentioned levels of wage as random testing at high-risk places and people such as hospitals, restaurants,
(Figure 22, right panel). Variation of the answer across different household characteristics is airports, truck drivers; regular monitoring of coughs/pneumonia cases, maintain
smaller than that to the question on demand for support, except for the formal vs. informal strict control/application of quarantine rules in both establishments and at home.
employment breakdown. The Government has also embarked on a plan to vaccinate the population as
much and as fast as possible. The public has a lot of trust in the Government, thus
showing vigilance by following the guidelines by the Ministry of Health, which can
be summarized as “Masks - Disinfection - Distance - Crowd avoidance - Medical
declaration”32.
32 In Vietnamese, it is the 5Ks rule “5K: Khẩu trang - Khử khuẩn - Khoảng cách - Không tập trung - Khai báo y tế”.
These are broader than the 3Ws rule “Wearing masks, washing hands and watching distance” being applied in the
pandemic time in many parts of the world.

These are key factors behind Viet Nam’s great success in containing the spread, lower middle-income countries at 26% in the same year33. Other measures such
thereby avoiding disruption of economic activities on a large scale. Such a as the gross savings as a percentage of GDP or net savings rate as a percentage
comprehensive strategy to combat the pandemic should be consistently of GNI also had similar dynamics over this period. This is a very disturbing trend,
implemented, updated and improved based on lessons learnt from wave to as the declining propensity to save contributes to the rising gap between
wave. investment and savings, which in turn reduces the country’s resilience and
increases its dependence on foreign savings (in the form of foreign borrowings
॓ Providing targeted support to hard-hit sectors. The risk of resurgence of the
and foreign direct and portfolio investment). It is therefore important to find ways
pandemic still remains high until a large proportion of the population is vaccinated
to encourage the saving culture among the population at large, including the
and/or effective treatments are available. Local lockdowns or location-specific
low-income people34.
restrictions cannot be ruled out. Therefore, while the overall economic recovery
is well under-way, it is uneven across sectors. Risks are still high in contact-intensive
Some findings and suggestions drawn from controlled experiments implemented
activities. Economic sectors such as air transportation, tourism and hospitality
in developing countries are worth considering: (i) Access to low-cost savings
industry still face considerable challenges, as documented in both rounds of RIM,
accounts increases savings and improves measures of individual wellbeing; (ii)
and GSO’s labor force surveys. In addition to helping otherwise healthy firms in
Marketing campaigns and account features that try to overcome psychological
these sectors to stay afloat, as it was already done, the Government can do some
obstacles to saving show promise in increasing take-up and use of savings
targeted interventions to stimulate employment demand in these hard-hit sectors
accounts; (iii) Technological innovations, including mobile money35 and direct
including phasing in the reopening process with vaccine passport, participating
deposit options (e.g. through traditional top-up of phone card with small cash),
in travel bubbles with relevant countries and designing and implementing
have the potential to expand access to and use of savings accounts36. Most
preventive procedures to receive inbound tourists etc.
recently, the Prime Minister agreed to pilot mobile money for two years, starting
॓ Enhancing labor mobility. Geographic and occupational mobility needs to from 9 March 2021. This is a big step forward for promoting financial inclusion in
be improved to accelerate the recovery process while ensuring it is inclusive. As general and raising savings in particular.
documented in both rounds of RIM, the lack of information on job availability and
॓ Triggering public work programs when they are badly needed. Public work
skills mismatch are among the main impediments for affected workers to move
programs provide immediate employment and income to the most vulnerable
across sectors and/or locations to get better employment opportunities.
because they are self-targeting. UNDP-introduced cash for work in Bac Lieu and
Ca Mau are some of the examples37.
This structural constraint can be relaxed through reskilling, labor market information
and job matching services, simplification of procedures, including to ensuring
RIM 2 survey found that 57.4% of respondents had a reservation wage (i.e. the
the continuity of the workers’ participation in the social and unemployment
minimum level of wage they require in order to accept the work) of under VND
insurances as well as the portability of the benefits across space. The education
120,000 (if they live in urban areas) or VND 95,000 (if they live in rural areas). The
and training curricula should put a stronger emphasis on transferable skills (e.g.
former falls into a lower range of regional minimum wages for 2021 while the
critical thinking and problem solving, soft and digital skills etc.) that are of great
latter is well below the range. This implies that demand for public work in times of
value regardless of sectors or locations of the workers.
economic downturn is relatively high, while it is cost-effective. Programs can be
organized by local government agencies that have a backlog of maintenance
The Government of Viet Nam is determined to accelerate digital transformation,
or small infrastructure work as well as environmental restoration that could
as evident by its prominent place in the 2021-2030 socio-economic development
be started and completed quickly. Such programs need to be designed and
strategy. As part of this process, digital technologies should be leveraged to support
implemented in a fast and gender-sensitive manner to meet the differentiated
the upskilling and reskilling program. In particular, digital platforms, including
needs of female and male workers.
YouTube or others should be used and/or developed to deliver training in skills
required in growing sectors to a large number of workers, including those from
the informal sector. As these Internet-based training programs can be considered
as “public goods” with large spillovers and social benefits, the Government can
provide monetary incentives to owners of the training content, based on the
number of hits. Such ex-post financial rewards resemble the incentives provided
by digital marketing firms to owners of digital platforms which are very common 33 Source: https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GNS.ICTR.GN.ZS?locations=VN
in the digital age. Information on the availability and usefulness of these and 34 In the early 2000s, as reported by the media then, low income workers in manufacturing firms frequently used
other digital platforms-based programs should reach out to as many workers part of their wages to purchase a few taels of gold (chỉ vàng, which is slightly heavier than a tenth of ounce) and
as possible, e.g., through TV, Facebook, Zalo, etc. Digital technology also helps set aside as a form of savings. Such a savings habit may explain why the savings rate was high in the early 2000s.
to speed up payments under the unemployment insurance program, which is This savings culture is very healthy for the economy and individuals alike, and therefore should be nurtured and
critical in challenging times. encouraged. However, gold is a very inefficient, sub-optimal form of savings, to which people resorted to in the
past in the absence of extensive banking services, and in the context of high inflation.
॓ Promoting saving. People, including the poor and the low income, can benefit 35 The number of registered mobile money accounts surpassed one billion in 2019. With 290 live services in 95
from saving to smooth consumption when income is uneven and unpredictable, countries and 372 million active accounts, mobile money is becoming the path to financial inclusion in most low-
and to insure against emergencies, thus increasing the resilience of the savers. income countries (Source: GSMA. 2019. “2019 State of the Industry Report on Mobile Money”. (Source: https://
However, as found in RIM 2 survey, almost half of households did not have any vnexpress.net/thu-tuong-dong-y-thi-diem-mobile-money-4246011.html).
savings at all, thus having no financial buffer to cushion income shocks. 36 Source: Jessica Goldberg, “Products and policies to promote saving in developing countries: Combine
At the country level, Vietnam’s gross savings rate as a percentage of GNI dropped behavioral insights with good products to increase formal savings in developing countries” (http://wol.iza.org/
from 39.5% in 2004 to only 24.5% in 2019, which is lower than the savings rate in articles/products-and-policies-to-promote-saving-in-developingcountries)
37 Source: . https://reliefweb.int/report/viet-nam/undp-womens-union-bac-lieu-and-ca-mau-provinces-support-
workers-affected-covid-19

॓ Making social assistance program respond faster and better to large-scale
shocks such as natural disasters, economic crisis and health emergencies like
the COVID-19 pandemic. Both rounds of RIM found that the Government’s
6. CONCLUSION
support reached only a limited segment of the population, largely the traditional
beneficiaries of the targeting program. The targeting program has so far done The RIM 2 survey confirmed that Vietnamese households are on the road to recovery.
well with regards to the “fixed” targets, as evident by the positive assessment However, until a large proportion of the population is vaccinated, they may still face
of the support by the recipients as documented in RIM 2 survey. However, it considerable challenges ahead. The findings summarizing the voices of vulnerable people,
generally failed to hit the “moving targets”, i.e., unable to deliver the support to household businesses and policy recommendations drawing on these findings serve as
people in the so-called “missing middle” who are not on the program’s list but are inputs to the Government’s efforts in refining policy actions and their implementation to
hit hard by economic shocks. Although the Government’s Resolution 42 intended protect the livelihoods of vulnerable households and support HBs. The report, recognizing
to support numerous groups of informal workers, the lack of information and the the fast-changing situation, suggests the need for regular assessments of the changing
resultant high transaction costs of verification of eligibility of the spatially and impacts of COVID-19 and the Government’s response policies to inform the design and
occupationally mobile workers often prevented them from accessing the support delivery of an effective, sustainable and inclusive recovery plan.
package. Although the outbreaks of the pandemic became shorter and more
localized from wave to wave thanks to the Government’s improved measures to To this end, Anticipatory, Adaptive and Agile governance approaches and innovations of the
crush the curve, and therefore the need for informal workers to access the support Government and the Vietnamese people have been key to Viet Nam’s success in crushing
declines as the economy is recovering, lessons need to be learnt to improve the the COVID-19 pandemic and limiting its negative socio-economic impacts - a success that
coverage, speed and thereby the effectiveness of the social assistance program is widely acknowledged by the public in Viet Nam and the international community. Policy
in the future. and institutional actions to reduce numerous structural constraints become more urgent
in challenging times, while they remain important in good times. Such approaches that
To this end, a number of suggestions can be made as follows. First, it is important combine improving short-term responses with strengthening long-term fundamentals are
to move from a residence-based system of social protection, which excludes vital in helping Vietnamese enterprises and people to firmly get back on the fast, sustainable
Vietnamese migrant workers, to one based on national citizenship. Second, and inclusive growth trajectory. This, in turn, is foundational to achieving the Sustainable
like in other areas, digital technologies would help to substantially cut down Development Goals (SDG) and Leaving No One Behind agenda in the context of living with
transaction costs associated with eligibility verification and delivery of cash the COVID-19 new normal.
handout to recipients. The latter is a big challenge during times of lockdown, and
when there is a need to reach out to people in remote areas in a rapid manner.
Accelerating inclusive digital transformation in tandem with the Government’s
plan to abolish the resident registration (Ho Khau) in 2021 and with the recently
started pilot of mobile money would mark a turning point in the reform of the
social assistance program in the digital age. It is also worth considering central
government matching grants to provinces with limited financial resources to
increase coverage and accelerate implementation.

REFERENCES ANNEX 1. QUESTIONNAIRES
Goldberg, Jessica . 2014.“Products and policies to promote saving in developing countries:
Combine behavioral insights with good products to increase formal savings in developing A.1. QUANTITATIVE QUESTIONNAIRE OF THE
countries” (https://wol.iza.org/articles/products-and-policies-to-promote-saving-in-
developing-countries) PHONE SURVEY
GSMA. 2019. “2019 State of the Industry Report on Mobile Money”
A. Questions to identify interviewees
GSO. “Report the impact of COVID-19 epidemic on labor and employment in the third
quarter of 2020”, accessed at http://consosukien.vn/bao-cao-tac-dong-cua-dich-covid-
19-den-tinh-hinh-lao-dong-viec-lam-quy-iii-nam-2020.htm ॓ [Self-fill in information] Interviewer: ..................................
॓ [Self-fill in information] Inteviewee code:
a. Household ID from VHLSS (Province- District- Commune - Household number)

b. Phone number of interviewee: ......................................
c. Full name of interviewee: ..............................
An introduction to the research [to convince the interviewee to participate in the survey]
Hello, Mr/Ms. My name is …. I’m an interviewer from Center for Analysis and Forecasting
under the Vietnam Academy of Social Sciences. I got your phone number, in a
randomly selected list of over 40 thousands of households nationwide. In 2018, you were
interviewed by the General Statistics Office in the Household Living Standard Survey.
The survey takes place every 2 years by the State to obtain information for research
and formulation of socio-economic policies. Today, I am calling you to ask you some
questions about COVID19, how it affect to your family, just in 10 minutes. All information
will be kept confidentially for the policy research purpose only. I hope you will cooperate
so that we can complete this survey.
A1. I would like to have a quick disusion in 10-minute to know about how COVID 19 impact
on your family?
a. Do not agree to participate [Thanks to leave the call]
b. Agree to participate
c. Call back later
A2. [If A1=c] What time can I call you back?
Time: ...................................................
B. Impact
B1. Any member in the family has been impacted by the COVID-19 since the beginning of
the year? [1. Yes. 2. No]
Type of impact You Any other member

a. Laid off waged workers [if B1a=2]
b. Temporal break from work [if B1b=2]
c. Reduce working hours and [if B1c=2]
work sharing

B2. What was your occupation by the end of 2019? B7. [Only if B5=a] Has your job moved to another province or within the same province as in
Dec 2019?
B2a. Sector a. Yes, moved to another province
a. FDI b. No, in the same province
b. Domestic firms
c. SOE B8. [Only if B5=a] Has you moved to other occupation or work in the same occupation as
d. Corporative in Dec 2019?
e. Household business a. Same occupation
f. Self-employed b. Other occupation
g. Inactive
B9. [only if the interviewee did not change the job due to COVID B5=b or B5=c] Since end
B2b. Occupation: 2019, apart from you, in your household, has anyone else moved to a new job because of
In details: ……………………………………………………………………………………………………… COVID-19 or other reasons?
a. Due to COVID-19, did move to a new job [skip to B11]
B3. Currently, do you work in the same job as by the end of 2019? b. Move to a new job due to other reasons (poison effect, for promotion, due to
a. The same job [skip to B5] family arrangement, due to the distance from work…) [skip to B14]
b. New job/inactive c. No move/ no new job
B4. What is your occupation currently? B10. [if no move to a new job while facing the employment difficulty due to COVID-19 B9=c
and B1=1] Why has he/she not change the job? [multiple choices]
B4a. Sector
a. FDI 1. Yes
b. Domestic firms Reason
2. No
c. SOE
a Wait for the pandemic ending and rely on the savings
d. Corporative
e. Household business b Wait for the pandemic ending, rely on unemployment benefits and
f. Self-employed policy supports
g. Inactive c Wait for the pandemic ending, due to thinking of no available
temporary job
B4b. Occupation:
d Psychological hesitancy to quit when mangers have temporary
In details: ………………………………………………………………………………………………………
difficulties
B5. Have you moved to a new job because of COVID-19 or other reasons since end 2019? e No skill of other jobs
a. Due to COVID-19, did move to a new job [skip to B7] f Have household difficulties then cannot move to new jobs
b. Move to a new job due to other reasons (poison effect, for promotion, due to
g Have looked for the job but found no relevant recruitment
family arrangement, due to the distance from work…) [skip to B9]
c. No move/ no new job h Applied for new jobs but could not meet new job requirements
i Other
B6 [if no move to a new job while facing the employment difficulty due to COVID-19 B5=c
and B1=1] Why has you not change your job? [multiple choices] B11. [Only if B9=a] Has his/her job moved to another province or within the same province
as in Dec 2019?
1. Yes a. Yes, moved to another province
Reason
2. No b. No, in the same province
a Wait for the pandemic ending and rely on the savings
B12. [only if B9=a] What was his/her occupation by the end of 2019?
b Wait for the pandemic ending, rely on unemployment benefits and policy
supports
B12a. Sector
c Wait for the pandemic ending, due to thinking of no available temporary a. FDI
job b. Domestic firms
d Psychological hesitancy to quit when mangers have temporary difficulties c. SOE
d. Corporative
e No skill of other jobs
e. Household business
f Have household difficulties then cannot move to new jobs f. Self-employed
g Have looked for the job but found no relevant recruitment g. Inactive
h Applied for new jobs but could not meet new job requirements
i Other B12b. Occupation:
In details: ………………………………………………………………………………………………………

B13. [Only if B9=a] Has he/she moved to other occupation or work in the same occupation C3. [Only if C1=2] What is the reason for not implementing the anti-epidemic measures?
as in Dec 2019? [Multiple choice]
a. Same occupation a. Unnecessary
b. Other occupation b. Necessary but did not know how to do
c. Necessary but too expensive, unable to apply (network infrastructure,
B14. Estimate total household income [-9999 if no information] equipment, etc)
d. Others
Month Million VND
C4. Does your family currently shop online more than in December 2019?
Dec 2019
Oct 2020 C5. Does your family currently use more electronic payments than in December 2019?
B15. [only if B14=-9999] Was your household income in Oct 2020 as percentage share of that C6. Other measures to cope with COVID-19 currently [in Oct 2020]?
in Dec 2019?
1.Yes
B16. COVID-19 has caused any difficulty to your household currently [in Oct 2020]? Coping measure
- 2. No
Use saving
1. Yes - 2. No
Reduce > 30% expenses (compared to Dec 2019)
Daily shopping
Reduce 10-30% expense (compared to Dec 2019)
Taking care of children’s education
Reduce < 10% expense (compared to Dec 2019)
Taking care of health care for household member
Reduce food expense (compared to Dec 2019)
Conflict in the family
Reduce education expense (compared to Dec 2019)
Domestic violence
Reduce electricity and water expense (compared to Dec 2019)
Others
Reduce health expense (compared to Dec 2019)
Reduce rental house feee
B17. Gender role in the family activity currently [in Oct 2020]? Tak new loans (friends, relatives, ..)
Delay to pay cost of living
1. Male - 2. Female -
Reschedule current loans
3. No gender difference
Sell valuable assets
Daily shopping
Others
Taking care of children’s education

Taking care of health care for household member C7. With the current savings, how many months would your household rely on that for your
household expenses?
C. Coping measures
D. Support
C1. Are you currently taking any measures against COVID-19 [in Oct 2020]?
1. Yes D1. Has your household ever received any support due to the COVID19 pandemic since the
2. No [skip to C3] beginning of 2020?
a. The household has recieved the support
C2. [only if C1=1] which measure [Multiple choices] b. The household has not received any supprt, just the information [skip to D4]
c. Do not care, do not know [skip to D4]
At work At home
Mask D2. [only if D1=a] Who or what organization has your household received support from?
[Multiple choices]
Wash hand with soap, alcohol-based hand rub a. From Government’s Resolution No. 42
Temperature check b. From local social associations (Youth Union, Women’s Union ...)
Cancelling meetings c. From Commercial Banks in loan payment reschedule, rollover loans and interest rate
reduction
Other d. Support in business by other enterprises/professional associations/business partners
e. From the Employment Fund / Social Insurance Fund, Unemployment Insurance, State
Health Insurance
f. Financial support from family and relatives
g. Others

D3. [only if D1=a] In general, has the policy support been implemented effectively? [Rank
from 1 to 5]
A2. GUIDELINES FOR FACE-TO-FACE INTERVIEWS
1 2 3 4 5
Very ineffective Ineffective No comment Effective Very effective ॓ Information about the impact of COVID by gender since April 2020
॓ How has the concept of the role of caring for a family changed? the family
D4. Is the current government’s disease control system against COVID-19 trustful? [Rank burden, especially the position of the family and society?
from 1 to 5]
॓ How has the current normal state been changed? What is the NEW normal state?
What is the obvious change in mode of operation / technology? Success or failure
1 2 3 4 5
to overcome challenges during the period from the beginning of the year until
Very untruthful Untrustful No comment Trustful Very trustful now? How is readiness to respond to the pandemic?
॓ What factors affect different levels of impact, different capacity to handle
D5. Does your household really need support if the pandemic breaks out? [1. Yes; 2. No] difficulties? Different negotiating possibilities? WHY factors, circumstances, how
they fail - they cannot change - they survive COVID - they persevere - they have
D6. If the pandemic lasted more than 3 months, would you accept public work for… the ability to build up savings to cope
[wage]…?
॓ How is support from personal networks, acquaintances, unions, and interactions
Wage with associations? What is the role of the cooperatives, professional associations?
How useful are the new business models?
Urban 120,000 VND/day/person
Rural 95,000 VND/ day/person
E. Other information
E1. In 2018, you already participate in the survey to give the information about all member
in your household. Are you still live with the household in ……………(District) ……………….
(Province)?
a. Interviewee lives at the previous address
b. Interviewee and his/her household moved to other province
c. Interviewee leaved out of his/her household to other province (for more than 6
months)
E2. How many members in your household by end 2019?
E3. How many members in your household currently [in Oct 2020]?
E4. Your household status in the official list?
Currently
Dec 2019
(Oct 2020)
a. Poor
b. Near poor
Thank you so much for your cooperation. All information will be kept confidential for policy
recommendation purpose only. Take care and goodbye!

ANNEX 2. KEY FINDINGS OF Table 2. Sectoral real labor income per worker in quarters 2 and 3: Summary statistics
ANALYSIS OF LABOR FORCE Q2/2020 vs. Q2/2019 Q3/2020 vs. Q3/2019
SURVEY Mean (%) -6.6 -4.4
Median (%) -6.5 -5.6
Maximum (%) 22.6 13.6

Real labor incomes dropped substantially in quarter 2, but started to recover in quarter
3 of 2020 Minimum (%) -25.1 -13.5
Analysis of datasets of Labor Force Survey (LFS) reveals that real labor incomes (see Box 7) Coefficient of
-1.43 -1.37
for calculation) in quarters 2 and 3 of 2020 were respectively by 7.2% and 4.9% lower than in variation
the same periods of 2019. In nominal terms, these figures were 4.6% and 1.8% respectively. Source: Our calculation based on data of Labor Force Survey
Note: Coefficient of variation is equal to standard deviation divided by the mean
Box 7. Quarterly Price Deflators Service sectors dominated the list of top income losers in both quarters 2 and 3 of 2020
To adjust for inflation, reported nominal incomes are deflated to the price level of January In quarter 2, the top ten income losers are all service sectors, most of which are contact-
2018. In doing this, a price deflator is calculated for each month for the period from January intensive, presumably because of the impact of nationwide lockdown implemented in April
2018 to September 2020, using Consumer Prices Index (CPI) accumulated from January 2020. Among these losers, the largest are catering and transport, employing approximately
2018 to that month. Then the price deflator for a quarter is calculated as the average of 2.4 million and 1.7 million workers on average in the two quarters respectively39. Other
price deflators of the three months in the quarter. This calculation results in the following services employing almost 1 million workers rebounded strongly, from -20% in quarter 2 to
quarter price deflators as follows: 5.1% in quarter 3, presumably thanks to the relaxation of social distancing measure in the
latter quarter.
Table 1. Quarterly Price Deflators
In quarter 3, this list changed quite substantially, with the inclusion of forestry, food processing
and two manufacturing industries - electric equipment and chemistry. Notably, forestry,
2020 2019 2018 which employs approximately 560,000 workers experienced persistent decline in real labor
income per worker, down by 14.7% and 11.6% in quarter 2 and quarter 3 respectively. Yet,
Q2 Q3 Q2 Q3 Q2 Q3 forestry is also a low income sector. The average real income per worker in this sector in
quarters 2 and 3 of 2019 was equal to approximately 45% of the median value for the whole
6.24 7.24 3.31 3.90 0.94 1.85 economy.
Tourism, hospitality industry and transport persistently appeared in this list of top losers in both
Source: Our calculations based on GSO’s monthly Consumer Price Index quarters, presumably due to the suspension of inbound commercial flights from April 2020
until now, resulting in a 98% drop of inbound tourists in quarter 3 from last year, as reported
by GSO. Local lockdowns of Da Nang and Quang Nam, the country’s major destinations for
tourists in late July and throughout August also retarded the recovery of these inter-linked
Income changes at the two-digit sector level are given in Figure 23. This figure shows that sectors. Catering, which employs approximately 2.4 million workers with under-the-median
the overwhelming number of sectors suffered from declines in real labor income per worker. real income per worker in 2019 was hit hard in quarter 2, but rebounded relatively well,
However, most of them bounced back significantly, as evident by smaller income declines from -19.2% in quarter 2 to -10.2% in quarter 3, but both drops were considerably higher in
in quarter 3 than in quarter 2. Correlation between changes in real income per workers in respective median values of -6.5% and -5.6% for these two quarters.
the two quarters is relatively high at 0.45, indicating that the impact of the pandemic on
sectoral labor income had some degree of persistence.
Labor income effects of the pandemic varied considerably across two-digit sectors
There was a considerable variation of quarter-on-quarter38 growth rates of real labor

incomes across 56 sectors of the economy in both quarters, as is visualized in Figure 23.
It is also quantified by relatively high coefficient of variation, which is equal to standard
deviation divided by the mean. Furthermore, the rates for quarter 3 of 2020 varied within a
considerably narrower range than for quarter 2 of 2020, with a lower coefficient of variation.
38 This is the measure of performance in one quarter compared to the same quarter of a different year. This is 39 Total number of workers in the economy in quarter 2 and quarter 3 of 2020 was approximately 50.5 million and
done so that growth or decline might be measured without having to account for seasonal variance. 52.5 million respectively.

Figure 23. Changes in sectoral real labor income per worker, Q2/2019-Q2/2020 and Q3/2019-Q3/2020 (%) Labor income impact of the pandemic was negligible on agriculture and modest on
export-oriented manufacturing
Figure 23 also shows that incomes of 13.9 million workers (in quarter 2 of 2020) in agriculture
were slightly affected. Their real incomes of workers declined modestly by 3.6% in quarter
2, then rebounded to have resulted in a negligible drop by 0.2% in quarter 3. The seafood
sector employing 1.3 million workers in quarter 2 was more heavily affected, with labor real
income per worker declining by 7.2% and 9.1% in quarter 2 and quarter 3 respectively.
Meanwhile, despite weakened external demand, workers in export-oriented manufacturing
sectors with high degree of GVC integration, such as textile (employed 330,000 workers in
quarter 2), garment (2.6 million workers), footwear (1.6 workers), electronics (880,000 workers)
experienced modest declines in real labor incomes in quarter 3, by 4.7%, 5.5%, 5.5% and
4.3% respectively, all were below the median value for the whole economy of -5.6%. Earlier,
in quarter 2, real labor incomes per worker in textile and garment sectors dropped by 7%
and 9.1% respectively, higher than the median value of -6.5% for that quarter. These figures
for footwear and electronics were 5.8% and 5.3%.
Labor incomes in wood processing industry (employed 450,000 workers) bounced back
significantly, from -5.9% in quarter to 3.5% in quarter 3. Meanwhile, real labor income in food
processing industry, which employed 1.1 million workers in quarter 2, dropped by 8.7% and
9.7% in quarter 2 and quarter 3 respectively
Source: Our calculations based on data of Labor Force Survey (LFS)

ANNEX 3. SAMPLE OF FACE-TO- ANNEX 4. CORRELATES OF
FACE INTERVIEWS HOUSEHOLD’S INCOME
In-depth qualitative component focuses on in-depth interviews with local people.
REDUCTION BETWEEN OCTOBER
6 provinces are selected for the in-depth qualitative component: 2020 AND DECEMBER 2019:
Table 3. Locations of face-to-face interviews RESULTS OF REGRESSIONS
Region Province Sector focus
(2)
The North Ha Noi 1. FDI workers, migrants (1)
Those being
2. Informal labors, migrants in the street The whole
VARIABLES hit hard by
3. Small household businessess, local trading and sample
COVID-19
services
4. Tourism -5.334* -5.283
Married
Hoa Binh 1. Tourism (3.010) (4.014)
2. Agriculture
3. Local trading and services Single
4. Ethnic minorities
The Central Quang Binh 1. Tourism Household size 0.817 0.817
2. Agriculture (0.558) (0.785)
3. Local trading and services -1.306 -2.203
Having a female head
4. Ethnic minorities
(2.683) (3.579)
The South Ho Chi Minh 1. FDI workers, migrants
2. Informal labors, migrants in the street Having a male head
3. Small household businessess, local trading and
services Ethnic minority -3.098 -7.414*
4. Tourism (3.018) (4.174)
Dong Nai 1. FDI workers, migrants
2. Small household businessess, local trading and Kinh-Hoa
services
Dependent ratio (Age 15 and below, -0.005 0.389
Hau Giang 1. Agriculture/aquaculture or 65 and above)
2. Tourism (0.400) (0.576)
3. Services Age <30 5.419 9.388
4. Ethnic minorities (7.949) (10.485)
Age 30-40 9.917** 10.786*
The total size is 79 interviews, in which 17 households are ethnic minorities. (4.368) (6.468)
Table 4. Qualitative survey size (number of interviewees) Age 40-50 8.661** 12.937**
(4.163) (6.289)
Age 50-60 7.294* 10.659*
Male Female Total
(4.074) (6.306)
Agriculture/aquaculture 15 3 18
Age 60-70 4.500 6.692
FDI workers, migrants 2 7 9
Local retails 5 7 12 (3.890) (6.097)
Local services: drivers, carriers 7 2 9 Age above 70
Workers in hotels, household businessess on
Household head: Primary and lower 0.254 2.662
accomodations 3 6 9
education (4.135) (7.016)
Household businessess: restaurants, drink shops 4 16 20 Household head: Lower secondary -1.650 -1.209
Other small household businessess 0 2 2 education (4.101) (7.034)
Total 36 43 79 Household head: Upper Secondary 0.323 1.057
education (4.517) (7.644)
Source: Qualitative survey in November 2020

(2) (2)
(1) (1)
Those being Those being
The whole The whole
VARIABLES hit hard by VARIABLES hit hard by
sample sample
COVID-19 COVID-19
Household head: College education 1.854 0.523 Region: North Central 3.223 1.110
(7.251) (9.881) (3.312) (4.452)
Household head: No vocational training 20.208 24.116 Region: South Central 4.654 2.085
(13.742) (18.825) (3.117) (4.319)
Household head: 1-2-year vocational 20.779 27.613 -1.184 -0.069
Region: South East
training (13.880) (19.003) (3.170) (4.337)
Household head: Professional secondary 16.780 30.031 Region: Mekong River Delta
(14.238) (19.710)
Sector: Manufacture garment, footwear... 7.293* 4.385 Constant -17.526 -20.809
(4.215) (5.848) (15.674) (22.521)
Sector: Manufacture agri processing 1.214 -6.452 Observations 935 613
(4.820) (6.890) R-squared 0.071 0.073
Sector: Construction 5.820 2.533
(3.631) (5.028)
0.983 -1.337 Standard errors in parentheses; *** p<0.01, ** p<0.05, * p<0.1
Sector: Agriculture Fishery
(3.279) (4.974)
Sector: Tourism, hotel & restaurant 13.219** 10.818
(5.498) (7.058)
Sector: Trading 10.712*** 7.380
(3.919) (5.390)
Sector: Transportation 6.762 0.887
(5.633) (7.429)
Sector: Education Other services 2.793 -0.954
(3.389) (4.897)
Sector: Unactive
Head job with social insurance -6.383* -5.892

(3.394) (5.173)
Head job without social insurance
Having household businesses 4.690** 5.312**

(1.927) (2.602)
Having no household businesses
Urban 1.226 -0.362

(2.142) (2.878)
Rural
Region: North East 1.895 3.016

(3.789) (5.217)
Region: North West 0.096 1.544
(3.766) (5.269)
Region: Red River Delta 1.797 1.949
(2.956) (3.994)

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Full report: COVID-19 Socio-economic Impact

Box 1. Significant recovery........................................................................................ 26

Full report: COVID-19 Socio-economic Impact

Full report: COVID-19 Socio-economic Impact

With a view to gathering information that is complementary to mainstream data collected

Full report: COVID-19 Socio-economic Impact

A discernible rise in transient income poverty in October

Income recovery from the peak of the pandemic in April

The percentage of households using electronic payment increased to 10.1% of households

Full report: COVID-19 Socio-economic Impact

Full report: COVID-19 Socio-economic Impact

Full report: COVID-19 Socio-economic Impact

To minimize the possibility of selecting households without a telephone number, those

3.2. Sample selection Replacement

Full report: COVID-19 Socio-economic Impact

Figure 2. Spatial distribution of the surveyed households

Source: Our calculation based on RIM 2 data

Figure 1 is self-explanatory. It presents distribution by the number of the surveyed households

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Full report: COVID-19 Socio-economic Impact

Source: Our calculation based on RIM 2 data

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All Affected only All Affected only

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Informal jobs 12.7 Informal jobs 15.4

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but gender disparities were evident in some shopping children's

activities All Female-headedSource:

F9 division of family responsibilities (%)

Doing daily shopping 11.9 66.0 22.1

Taking care of members' health 23.0 33.8 43.1

Taking care of children education 16.8 33.5 49.8

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4.5. Coping measures FigureFigure 11. Preventive

The percentage of households using electronic payment increased to 10.1% of households

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3.6 3.6 36.2 36.2

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Female, 32 years old, selling lottery tickets, Ho Chi Minh

Male, ethnic minority, 42 years old, agriculture, Hau Giang

Male, 40 years old, carrier, Quang Binh

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Male-headed Female-headed All

Male, 35 years old shoe worker, Ho Chi Minh

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Figure 16. Savings availability (% households) 30.2

Qui�le 21.3 Qui�le

Source: Our estimation from RIM 2 survey data

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but generally progressive All

Bo�om quin�le 79.5

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Full report: COVID-19 Socio-economic Impact

Full report: COVID-19 Socio-economic Impact

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a. Household ID from VHLSS (Province- District- Commune - Household number)

Type of impact You Any other member

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Full report: COVID-19 Socio-economic Impact

Full report: COVID-19 Socio-economic Impact

E2. How many members in your household by end 2019?

E4. Your household status in the official list?

Having household businesses 4.690 5.312