COVID-19, Corona Virus Disease 2019 created a major economic loss in the globe. Not only India, other countries are also facing the same.
The impact of the coronavirus pandemic on India has been disturbing both in respect of economic activity and human health. The impact was noticed in almost all the different sectors as there was a sudden fall in domestic demand and exports.
The economies of more than 100 countries have been destroyed and some of the countries were bound to ask for help from the IMF. USA, Spain, and Italy are the most affected country in terms of death rates. Among the different sectors, the most affected ones are Aviation and Tourism Sector , Pharmaceuticals , Oil and Gas and Telecom Sector.
Aviation and Tourism Sector
Aviation and Tourism were the very first industries that were affected due to this pandemic and their contribution to the Indian GDP were 2.4% and 9.2% respectively. According to the IATO estimates, both industries occurred a huge loss of 85 billion Rupees due to the travel restriction and complete lockdown. Due to this pandemic, there were a lot of changes which have been introduced in both these industries like contactless boarding in flights and web check-in procedure in hotels.
Pharmaceuticals
The pharmaceutical industry has been rising from the beginning of the pandemic. With the huge market of $55 billion, India saw the maximum rise as they are the largest producer of generic drugs globally. During this pandemic, India exported Hydroxychloroquine to the US, Canada, UK ,and Middle-East. Even the huge demand for face mask and sanitizers during the lockdown helped the pharmaceutical industry to earn more revenue out from this sudden demand.
But the sudden increase in the price of raw materials imported from China, heavy reliance on imports, unavailability of labor ,and disturbed supply chain disrupted the pharmaceuticals industry. The Pharmaceuticals industry is struggling due to the government-imposed bans on critical drugs, PPE kits ,and equipment to make sure sufficient quantities for the country.
Oil and Gas
The Indian Oil & Gas industry is the third-largest energy consumer after the USA and China, which contributes to 5.2% of the global oil demand. Due to this pandemic, the demand for transport fuels has largely declined and affected the industry severely. Although the crude oil prices have plunged, the government decided to increase the excise and special excise duty to make up for the revenue loss experienced during the lockdown.
Telecom
There has been a lot of changes in the telecom sector of India before the pandemic due to the brief price wars between the different service providers. With the introduction of Jio company by Rellaince, the internet usage has drastically gone up as people started enjoying free data services by Jio and the price has suddenly came down which made 4G data services more affordable to use. Due to this market implementation, the other service providers lost a huge part of consumer and incured a huge loss.
COVID-19 and work from home:-
With the implementation of ‘work from home’, the essential services and sectors were running smoothly and the telecom service providers had a huge contribution to this. As of 2019, with over 1 billion connections, the telecom sector contributes about 6.5% of GDP and employs almost 4 million people. The broadband services also played an important role and due to the increased usage, it resulted in pressure in the network.
The New Normal
Due to this uncertain pandemic situation, the whole economy has been disturbed on a big scale. The sudden downfall of demand and increased unemployment has altered every business scenario. The economy will take time to sit back once again with the help of taxes and creating a demand. The Government will support families under financial distress and try to bring employment in India.
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