Covid-19 may cause $3.6bn loss to GDP: World Bank report.

Byline: Amin Ahmed

ISLAMABAD -- A new World Bank policy brief on the tourism sector of South Asia estimates that the potential loss to Pakistan's gross domestic product (GDP) due to the impact of Covid-19 pandemic would be $3.64 billion, while Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province is likely to suffer $10 million to $20m in losses.

The policy brief, 'Covid-19 and Tourism in South Asia', further estimates that the impact of coronavirus outbreak has put at risk 880,000 jobs in the tourism sector of Pakistan.

The highest impact of Covid-19 pandemic is on India which faces a potential loss of $43.4bn to the GDP, followed by Nepal with potential loss of $460m and the Maldives $700m to the GDP.

A summary of Covid-19 tourism response activities by the Pakistan government lists cash grant or subsidies, tax rebates/relief/extension, fee/bills waivers, tourism communications or crisis task force, support for industry to address contamination, repurpose tourism assets for crisis operations, national carriers waiving cancellation fees and maintain cargo operations of national carriers.

Statistics in the World Bank brief show that the doAAmestic spending percentage of the whole economy GDP in Pakistan on tourism is 4.09 per cent, while the percentage of flow of South Asia intraregional visitors placed Pakistan at 3.25pc. Highest 63.94pc is of India, followed by Bangladesh 13.02pc, Sri Lanka 11.19pc, Nepal 6.22pc, the...