Livelihood vulnerability and adaptability to the Covid-19 pandemic of households in Hiep Binh Phuoc ward, Thu Duc City

Abstract

This study used the survey data of 120 households in Hiep Binh Phuoc ward, Thu Duc City which is part of Ho Chi Minh City, to analyze the changes of living, livelihoods and income of the people during the social distancing period covering the 4th Covid-19 outbreak from June to September 2021. The research results show that, during the period, people were not allowed to go out, which provided positive effects to the household members in reducing expenditures on outdoor transportation and snacks expenditure , while also gaining more time for listening to music, watching movies, taking care of their own family members. However, most of the household's livelihoods were adversely affected by the suspension, the reduction of working hours and the switching to working from home or working online. More than 72% of survey households were cramped at home, subjected to stress and could not go to the hospital for regular health check-ups. The labor rate of surveyed households had reduced income: traders, workers, and self-employed accounting to 76%; 20% of the surveyed had unchanged income, mostly government officials, teachers and retirees; and only 4% of the laborers had an increase in income. After more than 120 days, households resume to usual mode when most people can already go out to start a new normal life with the Covid-19 pandemic. The results of the ordered logistic regression show that there are 5 variables affecting the adaptability of households to Covid-19 as follows: physical assets, financial assets, human assets, and housing status. The sign of the regression coefficients of all asset variables is positive, indicating that household's livelihood assets play an important role in overcoming difficulties while increasing the adaptability to Covid-19 in particular and other possible future shocks in general. The policy-making agencies should promote the self-reliance of households, encourage households to reorganize their livelihood activities. In addition, the local government needs to coordinate with the agencies to organize vocational training courses and skills for households, especially information technology applications for online working and the trend of industrial revolution 4.0.