Un­em­ploy­ment, hunger and pover­ty have been grip­ping the pop­u­la­tion of T&T with the clo­sure of busi­ness­es due to the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic.

The re­stric­tions put in place by the Gov­ern­ment to help curb run­away num­bers of in­fec­tions and deaths have forced busi­ness­es to close their doors and lay off em­ploy­ees and it has al­so im­pov­er­ished work­ing peo­ple who were al­ready strug­gling.

Some peo­ple who have lost their jobs have be­come des­per­ate as they do not know where their next meal will be com­ing from or how they will pay their bills. Many peo­ple are be­ing evict­ed from their homes and their men­tal health are be­ing af­fect­ed. While thou­sands have been clam­our­ing for help from the Gov­ern­ment and have re­ceived food re­lief ham­pers and em­ploy­ment re­lief cheques, hun­dreds of oth­ers have not been so lucky.

With nowhere to turn, they have been forced to flock to Non-Gov­ern­men­tal Or­gan­i­sa­tions like Liv­ing Wa­ter Com­mu­ni­ty, Kind­ness Makes a Dif­fer­ence Foun­da­tion, the Catholic Com­mis­sion for So­cial Jus­tice, the An­ju­man Sun­nat ul Ja­maat As­so­ci­a­tion and oth­er groups help­ing out the less for­tu­nate across the coun­try. Some of these groups, un­able to keep up with the in­crease in de­mand have been ap­peal­ing to cor­po­rate T&T to lend a hand.

Labour Min­is­ter Stephen Mc­Clashie told the Sun­day Guardian that from Jan­u­ary to April 2021, 235 peo­ple filed with the Min­istry of Labour as be­ing un­em­ployed. Last year, he said, that fig­ure was 2,744 peo­ple. How­ev­er, hun­dreds of peo­ple who have lost their jobs have not gone to the min­istry to file their un­em­ploy­ment sta­tus. Mc­Clashie did not give an es­ti­mate of the to­tal num­ber of peo­ple who are un­em­ployed in the coun­try at this time.

Ac­cord­ing to econ­o­mist Dr Re­gan De­o­nanan along with Ben­jamin Ramkissoon from his UWI re­search group, the un­em­ploy­ment rate for T&T was 3.5 per cent in 2019 and jumped to 6.7 per cent in 2020.

De­o­nanan and Ramkissoon, in a state­ment, said the "mod­elled es­ti­mates" came from the In­ter­na­tion­al Labour Or­ga­ni­za­tion (ILO) which reg­u­lar­ly pub­lish­es un­em­ploy­ment fig­ures for coun­tries across the globe.

"The Cen­tral Sta­tis­ti­cal Of­fice of T&T (CSO) cal­cu­lates in­dices of hours worked and em­ploy­ment in cer­tain in­dus­tries. The in­dus­tries in­clude man­u­fac­tur­ing, elec­tric­i­ty, wa­ter, and oil and gas. These in­dices there­fore may not re­flect changes out­side of the man­u­fac­tur­ing sec­tor. How­ev­er, they are cor­re­lat­ed with of­fi­cial un­em­ploy­ment da­ta," ac­cord­ing to the state­ment.

"The in­dex of hours worked de­clined by 2.5 per cent from 2019 to 2020 (an­nu­al av­er­age) and the in­dex of em­ploy­ment de­clined by 1.9 per cent over the same pe­ri­od. Based on the cor­re­la­tion be­tween the sec­toral em­ploy­ment in­dices and the over­all un­em­ploy­ment rate, the over­all un­em­ploy­ment rate for 2020 may have been about 7.2 per cent. It is al­so rea­son­able to think that the fur­ther lock­down mea­sures in 2021 may have giv­en rise to high­er lev­els of un­em­ploy­ment than in 2020."

While there has been an in­crease in un­em­ploy­ment, De­o­nanan point­ed out that there has al­so been an in­crease in un­der­em­ploy­ment.

"All the above sta­tis­tics high­light the like­ly in­crease in the un­em­ploy­ment rate for 2020. Al­though the un­em­ploy­ment rate is an im­por­tant labour mar­ket sta­tis­tic, it does not por­tray the en­tire pic­ture."

He said peo­ple may re­main em­ployed but are work­ing few­er hours. "Oth­er in­di­vid­u­als may have lost their jobs but did not seek re-em­ploy­ment and would thus not be count­ed among the un­em­ployed," he added.

Al­though there has been no re­cent da­ta on pover­ty lev­els in T&T, De­o­nanan used da­ta from stud­ies done over the last 15 years in T&T.

"The Sur­vey of Liv­ing Con­di­tions (SLC) 2005 re­port­ed that 16.7 per cent of the pop­u­la­tion was poor, with the pover­ty line at TT $7,980 (an­nu­al). The SLC 2014 analy­sis re­vealed a pover­ty rate of 24.5 per cent. Since 2014, un­em­ploy­ment has risen. A high­er pro­por­tion of un­em­ployed work­ers may be linked to greater vul­ner­a­bil­i­ty to pover­ty."

How­ev­er, de­spite the grim sit­u­a­tion that the coun­try faces, Mc­Clashie re­mains op­ti­mistic that the worst is over.

"I be­lieve that the sit­u­a­tion has peaked. The rea­sons are that most busi­ness­es that had to make ad­just­ments would have done so al­ready. I think that we are at a peak. Now with vac­cines be­com­ing avail­able, what we will see is a slight re­duc­tion of those un­em­ployed. Of course, we will take some time to get out of this sit­u­a­tion. I think we will see a glim­mer of light."

Mc­Clashie said the Na­tion­al Em­ploy­ment Ser­vice (NES) unit at the Min­istry of Labour in­vites the un­em­ployed to drop in re­sumes which they match with em­ploy­ers seek­ing work­ers.

"We re­ceive ap­pli­ca­tions and re­sumes and we reg­is­ter peo­ple in the sys­tem. When we get re­quests from the var­i­ous min­istries, we match re­sumes to va­can­cies..."

When asked how many peo­ple have ap­plied to the NES unit for 2021 so far, he de­clined to give sta­tis­tics.

NGOs

Liv­ing Wa­ter de­mand for help in­crease by 50 per cent

Di­rec­tor, Liv­ing Wa­ter Com­mu­ni­ty Rhon­da Main­got said they have seen a 50 per cent in­crease in peo­ple com­ing to their build­ing in Port-of-Spain ask­ing for food and oth­er ba­sics.

"We have seen an in­crease, we have on­line reg­is­tra­tion. Most new peo­ple have lost jobs. There has been an in­crease of ap­prox­i­mate­ly 50 per cent in the last two months.”

The Liv­ing Wa­ter Com­mu­ni­ty dis­trib­utes cooked food and sand­wich­es every day feed­ing 300 peo­ple. Al­so, every week, they dis­trib­ute 700 ham­pers.

Giv­en the large in­crease in peo­ple ac­cess­ing their ser­vices, she ap­pealed to the cor­po­rate com­mu­ni­ty and those with re­sources to as­sist them with food, sand­wich­es, and ham­pers.

Food is pri­or­i­ty

Di­rec­tor, Kind­ness Makes a Dif­fer­ence Foun­da­tion Kavi­ta Rag­bir said that peo­ple are much more im­pov­er­ished as the pan­dem­ic has wreaked hav­oc on the coun­try's so­cial fab­ric.

Her NGO, which is based in San Fer­nan­do, de­liv­ers ham­pers, cooked food, pay the in­ter­net bills for needy stu­dents and help in house con­struc­tion for those fac­ing the hard times that the pan­dem­ic has brought on.

Her NGO gives out 100 ham­pers week­ly to needy peo­ple.

"Right now food is a pri­or­i­ty. We pro­vide ham­pers and cooked meals to those in need. We help fam­i­lies who move to a dif­fer­ent apart­ment in terms of trans­porta­tion. We al­so help poor­er peo­ple who need re­pairs to their homes. We help over 50 fam­i­lies week­ly with gro­ceries, we go to their homes to see what they need."

The group al­so helps fam­i­lies with their in­ter­net bills so that their chil­dren could en­gage in on­line school­ing. They have al­so helped some fam­i­lies with de­vices like lap­tops.

She called up­on the cor­po­rate com­mu­ni­ty and the wider na­tion­al com­mu­ni­ty to as­sist NGOs like the one she runs.

Peo­ple's men­tal health af­fect­ed

Chair­per­son, Catholic Com­mis­sion for So­cial Jus­tice, Leela Ramdeen told the Sun­day Guardian that the faith-based or­gan­i­sa­tion was in­volved in the dis­tri­b­u­tion of 90,000 ham­pers to needy peo­ple and the un­der­priv­i­leged in 2020.

Like oth­er NGOs, they have seen an in­crease in pover­ty in re­cent times.

"We re­al­ly don’t have ad­e­quate da­ta in T&T about how much pover­ty there is. Peo­ple have lost their jobs and are des­per­ate. Peo­ple are evict­ed from their homes and their men­tal health are be­ing af­fect­ed."

AS­JA dis­trib­ut­ing ham­pers

Pub­lic Re­la­tions Of­fi­cer An­ju­man Sun­nat ul Ja­maat As­so­ci­a­tion (AS­JA) Imam Raf­fa­ic Mo­hamed said that they dis­trib­uted 300 ham­pers in June. They al­so want to set up a train­ing pro­gramme to help un­em­ployed peo­ple to earn skills to help them be­come more mar­ketable.

Former barman Garfield Charles in happier times.

IMAGE COURTESY GARFIELD CHARLES

Grim sto­ries from the un­em­ployed

Two un­em­ployed peo­ple spoke to the Sun­day Guardian about how they have been pushed to the brink of pover­ty as they lost their jobs and have lit­tle or no way of earn­ing an in­come to feed their fam­i­lies.

Garfield Charles, who lives in Va­len­cia, had a take-home salary week­ly of $1,350 be­fore the pan­dem­ic.

The an­nounce­ment by Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley at the end of April that some busi­ness­es would be closed in­def­i­nite­ly was the straw that broke the camel’s back for Charles. He was sent home.

But Charles said that even be­fore April the own­ers of the bar had start­ed to cut back on his salary by half giv­en the re­stric­tions on their op­er­a­tions since the pan­dem­ic be­gan. Now he is out of a job, life has be­come chal­leng­ing with mount­ing bills.

"I ap­plied for the $1,500 re­lief grant and all I got was an email say­ing they re­ceived

my ap­pli­ca­tion but noth­ing from the Gov­ern­ment so far. My sit­u­a­tion is re­al­ly grim now. I’m in ar­rears with most of my util­i­ty bills, I have my T&TEC bill, phone bills. My son does on­line class­es and I have no mon­ey for my in­ter­net bill. I don't know how my son is go­ing to con­tin­ue his on­line school­ing," he said.

A de­pressed Charles said he even had to cut back on buy­ing food.

"The lit­tle mon­ey I have is to buy food. Soon I will not even have mon­ey for that. My sav­ings now de­plet­ed. The truth is I don’t know how long again I could last like this. Thank God up to last week, the own­er of the bar dropped by to help me with a lit­tle mon­ey to buy gro­ceries. I know that the bar own­ers are go­ing to cut that soon as they too in a bad sit­u­a­tion. On­ly God could help me."

He said, I have a wash­ing ma­chine for a year that broke down and I have no mon­ey to fix it. I have to wash by hand now. That tells the kind of sit­u­a­tion I’m in."

Ac­cord­ing to Charles, the own­ers of the bar had been as­sist­ing him over the last year, but they too have been un­der fi­nan­cial strain.

Charles said that his wife has be­come cre­ative, sell­ing soft drinks, sweets, and cig­a­rettes from their home in Va­len­cia, but he ad­mit­ted that mon­ey does not do much.

"I’m look­ing for a job but there are few busi­ness­es opened and those that are opened al­ready are sat­u­rat­ed. They’re not re­al­ly hir­ing. So I have few op­tions."

Strug­gling to sur­vive

Resh­ma Ram­per­sads­ingh, who lives in St He­le­na, used to work in a club in Mal­abar, Ari­ma, but has been un­em­ployed since April.

Al­though she is not mar­ried and has no chil­dren she said that be­ing with­out a job has pushed her to the brink of pover­ty as the small sav­ings she had has been wiped out.

"I know some oth­er friends who might still get $200 from their boss­es while they are at home, but I don’t even have that as my for­mer boss­es have so many bills to pay, they can’t af­ford to do that. In good times I earned $1,500 week­ly, then dur­ing COVID-19 I start­ed to earn less. I have my rent, phone bill, ca­ble bill, food to buy and I’m broke. I don’t know what to do."

She al­so as­sist­ed her moth­er, a pen­sion­er, when she was work­ing, but now she is un­able to do so. "Her pen­sion is not a lot when she has med­ica­tion and oth­er things to do."

With all the re­stric­tions in place, Ram­per­sads­ingh said there was lit­tle she can do to earn mon­ey on the side to feed her­self and pay bills.

"It’s not like I can sell food on the side and make a few dol­lars, the au­thor­i­ties said you can do noth­ing like that. Most of my sav­ings were de­plet­ed a while ago. So I’m strug­gling to sur­vive. If I have $100 in the bank, I have a lot. I’m hus­tling now, that’s what it reached to."

Her sit­u­a­tion is so des­per­ate, she has even cut back on how much she eats.

"I cut back my eat­ing by half. I just go to the gro­cery and buy a few ba­sics...I have mon­ey for noth­ing. I could imag­ine how hard it is for par­ents who have no jobs. How they’ll feed their chil­dren? It’s a fight to ex­ist."

On the verge of tears, she al­so said she ap­plied for the Gov­ern­ment grants and all she got was an email ac­knowl­edg­ing her re­quest.

"It’s heart­break­ing. Apart from the hunger and lack of mon­ey, peo­ple are dy­ing from COVID-19. This is the men­tal and emo­tion­al stress. On­ly God knows what I will do again."

San Fernando West consitituents wait in line at the office of the MP Faris Al-Rawi on Independence Avenue, San Fernando, in May to collect relief hampers which were donated by NAMDEVCO in partnership with the Ministry of Social Development.

KRISTIAN DE SILVA

Cen­tral Bank sta­tis­tics on re­trench­ment

T&T’s re­trench­ment fig­ures in­creased by 80 per cent last year, when com­pared to 2019, da­ta from the Cen­tral Bank showed.

"Da­ta on re­trench­ment no­tices filed at the Min­istry of Labour showed that 2,744 per­sons were re­trenched dur­ing 2020, much high­er than the 1,528 per­sons re­trenched dur­ing the pre­vi­ous year," the Cen­tral Bank stat­ed in its an­nu­al eco­nom­ic sur­vey for 2020.

The Cen­tral Bank’s re­port was pub­lished on its web­site in May.

"In 2020, most of the re­trench­ments oc­curred in the fi­nance, in­sur­ance, and re­al es­tate and oth­er busi­ness ser­vices (879 per­sons), man­u­fac­tur­ing (562 per­sons), and dis­tri­b­u­tion, restau­rants, and ho­tels (527 per­sons) in­dus­tries," the Cen­tral Bank stat­ed.

Ac­cord­ing to the Cen­tral Bank “re­trench­ment” refers to the ter­mi­na­tion of em­ploy­ment of a work­er at the ini­tia­tive of an em­ploy­er for the rea­son of re­dun­dan­cy ac­cord­ing to the Re­trench­ment and Sev­er­ance Ben­e­fits Act (No 32 of 1985).