Impact of COVID-19 on vegetable supply chain and food security: Empirical evidence from Bangladesh

Abstract

In Bangladesh, the COVID-19 pandemic is likely to have substantial effects on the livelihood of people, but smallholder vegetables growers will be even more affected because of the perishability nature of the product. The first case of COVID-19 was confirmed in Bangladesh on 8th March, 2020 and consequently the country went into lockdown on 26 March, 2020. This study has made a survey of vegetables farmers through a mobile phone to understand the impact of COVID-19 on vegetables supply chain, gross margin and the future production plan of the growers. In Bangladesh, the lockdown has disrupted the food supply chain and increases the likelihood of food insecurity. Lockdown has impeded vegetable farmers’ access to markets, thus limiting their productive and sales capacities. The price of yield has dropped by more than half resulting in huge loss for vegetable growers. The loss incurred by the farmers for producing Brinjal, Cucumber, Pointed gourd, Yardlong beans and Bottle gourd are BDT 4900, BDT 10900, BDT 57400, BDT 52500 and BDT 18500 per acre respectively as a result of COVID-19. The decreased income increases farmers’ likelihood of vulnerability and food insecurity and poses a challenge to continued produce. ‘Cash support’ is more important than ‘food support’ in order to keep vegetable farmers in farming, to ensure a ready supply of necessary low-cost resources, and to help fight against the upcoming food shortage.

Impact of COVID‐19 on agricultural production and distribution in South Asia

“…A survey study in Bangladesh (Malek et al, 2021) supported the findings where authors found that during COVID-19 period, the rural economy experienced adverse impacts, with delayed harvest, difficulty in selling farm produce, input disruptions, and cost increases. Another study (Alam & Khatun, 2021) also stated that decrease farmers' income enhanced the likelihood of vulnerability and posed a challenge to continue their produce which is similar to the study finding.…”

Food Consumption Behavior of Pakistani Students Living in China: The Role of Food Safety and Health Consciousness in the Wake of Coronavirus Disease 2019 Pandemic

“…The frequent food safety incidents and scandals in the Chinese food market, including the emergence of COVID-19, have increased the greater concerns of the sojourners with regard to food safety during their sojourning in China (Leone et al, 2020 ). During the emergence of COVID-19, the foodservice operators were among those who experienced the direct impact of the pandemic, which caused the potential source of infection (Aday and Aday, 2020 ). These types of concerns are consistent with food safety and are very important for food preferences.…”

Causal Impacts of Epidemics and Pandemics on Food Supply Chains: A Systematic Review

“…Restrictions of movement of goods (e.g., border restrictions; export restrictions; import restrictions) [7,10,14,[27][28][29]33,[36][37][38]48,52,58,70,[73][74][75][76][78][79][80][81][82][83][84]89,99,107,111,113,[115][116][117][118]123,127,131,137,[139][140][141][142][146][147][148][149]152,157,158,163,165,…”

“…Food distribution disruption [1,13,29,36,37,50,57,58,60,66,67,[71][72][73]75,79,80,84,92,100,106,108,118,136,140,142,171,183] Decision support tools Decision Support System (DSS) [3] Online infrastructures E-delivery services; online platforms [8,135] Transportation and distribution plans Short-term incentives for distributors [61] Distribution planning and resource allocation [14] Strengthening food storage and inter-and intra-island transport [171] Distribution strategy [67] Government financial assistance for companies Government humanitarian assistance [29,140] Reduction of fees and taxes [66,84,113] Government purchasing agricultural products from small farmers and shorter supply chains [84] Restructuring plans Emergency cashflow and liquidity measures [93] Significant funds [29] Activate the agricultural crisis reserve …”

“…Input's supply (ex: seeds, fertilizer, and agrochemicals) [8,10,29,37,38,41,51,[56][57][58]60,65,66,72,[78][79][80]84,89,92,99,101,104,105,108,110,112,132,136,140,161] Contingency plans Diversify the supply chain [57,72] Local inputs [110] Establish and operationalize the food bank, community seed bank, and buffer stock of fertilizers [78] Increase inventory levels [131] Diversify the supply chain [161] Sustaining the critical agricultural inputs [131] Anticipated reducing product lines and/or ingredients used [72] Establish an efficient procurement and distribution system [78] Cooperation and collaboration Public-private cooperation [60] Strength public-private-community partnership mechanisms [78] Government financial assistance for companies Seed and other input supplies should be ensured (government) [10,65,…”