The Covid Effect

The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed fissures that exist in the governance of digital services today, more so than it exemplifies the frailty of the human condition.

It may sound frivolous to talk about access to digital services at a time when people in Pakistan, about 40% may not have access to clean drinking water but we must insist that it is not.

In these last few weeks, our work on the front lines of architecting more access to data and connectivity has revealed to me that communicative services are lifelines for the poor and middle classes and only mobile operators can step up to face the challenge.

The manifestation of socio-economic disparities

The disparities in the problems faced by different social classes are very much real and must be corrected as we navigate through this pandemic. A wealthy family in Pakistan, a country ranked among bottom five in ICT readiness, probably has three children in three different temperature-controlled rooms. They sit amidst a pile of self-owned tech devices, pretending to do online homework from their preparatory schools and instead of browsing their choice of TikTok parodies and favorite YouTube stars predicaments.

Conversely, in a family in Wak Kant district, someone has died of covid and the police have sealed the house, forcefully quarantining the afflicted village. No emergency grocery runs, no walks in the park, and no visiting relatives to check on them. The impacted family has seven members, with five children living in one room sprawled in their designated corners waiting for the sun to set when the violence abates and the angry can sleep and then repeat. Domestic violence targeted towards women and children is endemic, yet we find an estimated surge of about 40 percent in both declared and unreported cases.

In an attempt to help its citizens, the Government announced a rations program for the poor. But they forget that the middle class is poor and the poor are destitute. In a country of 220 million, Pakistan’s 50 million who earn less than 2 dollars a day are burgeoning. Moreover, food alone cannot solve the plethora of issues that will inevitably arise from the lockdown.

When technology becomes a magic bullet

In these times, the technology remains to be the only equalizer and must not be undermined. Many mobile operators such as Jazz have taken up the responsibility and are actively working with the government to monitor and spread awareness of this pandemic. Jazz has announced a PKR 1.2 billion covid relief package, impactful because there are both communication and health relief components, but also because telcos understand that there may be an opportunity to leapfrog Pakistan into digital as Africa did.

Much of the telecom infrastructure in that continent almost synonymous with poverty, has enabled tech to work for the poor. Econometrics pipe-dreams aside, what Pakistan can do is not miss this train. No, a pandemic is not an opportunity that builds hopes over body bags and lung failures, in fact, it is the very tragedy of this horror that must demand a more meaningful response. Relief must come in the form of an open and accessible Internet and telecom services. 

At a national level, by interpreting telecom data, the Government has begun to understand hotspots and covid concentrated geolocations. It has also activated mass SMS alerts for those who are at risk and in contact with those at risk. Mobile operators are also partnering with provincial governments and NGOs. In Punjab, Jazz is working with the Ministers Delivery Unit (MDU), Punjab Health Department, and Mind Organization, a non-profit mental health care provider, to launch a COVID-19 Mental Wellbeing helpline titled “ Zehni Sehat Helpline’. Furthermore, there have also been partnerships with The Citizens Foundation to serve 10,000 people and distribute about PKR 40 million in peri-urban communities near the bustling city of Karachi.

Digital financial services and products have been integrated with the national database whereby an individual’s national identification number allows them to receive cash directly into their mobile wallets and collect cash or rations from their local merchants. With over 19 million total mobile accounts, JazzCash alone added close to 750,000 monthly active users to its wallet proposition and expects to see approximately 50 percent increase in mobile wallets. Many widows who had never before understood digital identity as a concept has stepped into the modern world by logging their biometrics at the JazzCash merchant next to their homes.

The need for conducive regulations and data-driven policies

Since Jazz’s announcement to contribute to covid relief, the telecom sector has pledged over PKR 5 billion. From announcing zero-rated calls to medical services, work from home discounts and by using digital technology to spread preventative awareness, the sector is leading the media sector into a post-covid era. These relief packages come at a time when the IMF has asked Pakistan to cut spending by a trillion dollars and increase tax collection by 31% if its to keep the troubled program on track - a tall order. The package from telcos also comes at a time when right before COVID-19 hit, Pakistan had amongst the highest tax levied on mobile and data services and the lowest price tariffs offered to customers. Despite being one of the highest tax contributors to the government, the public perception is largely built up as telcos eating gold for cereal and stifling the rest off to their foreign group heads.   

Arguably, we don’t know much about the intricacies of COVID-19, but we can certainly see that human behavior is impacted by certain policy decisions. Conducive regulations coupled with research-backed and data-driven policies are a need of the time. However, as always someone powerful and ill-informed wants to run things another way. Trump made medical claims that were false and Boris Johnson ended up disrespecting his security advisory and shaking hands with sick coronavirus patients on his visit to the hospital. He contracted the disease, ended up in ICU and that is the only thing that got him serious about listening to data.

There is no monopoly on absurdity. The mere presence of science doesn’t guarantee scientific thinking. You have to link it to scale and you have to decide and make policy. Most importantly, you have to be ok with experimenting. Governments cannot handle pandemics because they fear retribution for bad policy at the polls - winning is the end itself. The countries that are revolutionizing the governance game have one thing in common - they are led by women. China has apparently combated covid but they also have a more authoritarian style of leadership than most democratic countries feel like looking up to. 

Accessing national mental health helplines or giving a few communities food for a month may not cut it for a 220 million large and dysfunctional nation. Pakistan is an immature market in almost every aspect, and COVID-19 is larger-than-life crisis that the much-touted civilized world has got wrong. There is a systemic breakdown of a coherent national policy to tackle the covid response and there is a serious consideration to undo the lockdown right at the time deaths have tripled in the past six weeks. The Digital Pakistan arm of the government led by Google professional Tania Aidrus offers hope that only data-driven well-researched policy decisions will unfold.

By making communicative services an essential service, the government and particularly #DigitalPakistan team has scored a big win for the nation.