First Person: Oliver Bastienne, A COVID-19 Story
My name is Oliver Ronny Bastienne.
I'm a Seychellois
I'm currently the Chairman of the Seychelles Chamber of Commerce and Industry,
the main private sector organization here in Seychelles.
But that's not my full time job. I do that on a voluntary basis.
My main job is I'm a partner in a professional service firm.
How has the pandemic impacted your country?
Of course, the pandemic has infiltrated, if that's the right word,
within all our economies, all our jurisdiction and causing really a heavy impact
on the global economic activity.
Especially for us in Seychelles here. We rely heavily on international tourism.
It's almost translating to between 25% and 30% contribution towards our GDP.
If you really would understand the economy of a tourism destination,
almost all the sectors are indirectly linked to the tourism market.
Whilst the contribution of the tourism sector is 25% to 30% of our GDP,
of course with the reduction in activity from let's say 100 to basically zero
with regards to tourism traffic, when we closed our border down in March,
I feel that we've,
well not feel, but you can see the heavy impact that it has had on all businesses
and on jobs within the economy.
When you look at the initial projection that we had with the different economies,
the technicians and even the IMF, we were looking at a 10.8% contraction of our GDP
compared to around 3.5% pre-COVID level.
That was on the assumption that we will have a V-shaped recovery.
I think that when we look at the current situation,
when we look at how the pandemic is, I guess, translating now with wave two, wave three,
the V-shaped recovery is no longer an assumption that economists hold.
It’s now whether it's a U, or an L-shaped recovery.
That’s if you could term the recovery from that perspective.
The recent statement by our President,
which we at the chamber, we are more or less aligned,
that the recovery of the tourism market will take almost between three to five years.
What we're obviously seeing is that there's of course an impact on businesses
with a lot of businesses starting to consider closing down
or some have already closed down.
It's very sad because it's impacting the livelihood of the private sector
but it also impacts the livelihood of workers
because you're in a situation where jobs are being lost.
Even though we do have the various schemes and measures and fiscal intervention
that is there like a lot of other countries have made,
we are seeing the impact even though we have not felt the full impact just quite yet.
One of the key impacts that we see is because of the lack of tourism revenue coming in,
of course, it creates the demand-supply issue with regards to the foreign exchange element.
There we've seen an almost 10% devaluation of our Seychelles rupees against the dollar.
That is translating of course in your CPI numbers and of course personal disposable income.
The fact that we import the majority of our items here in Seychelles,
of course there's a big impact on the purchasing power of a lot of consumers.
I think in a nutshell, whilst we can go forever to look at the various impacts,
I think this is the main impact that we’re seeing here in Seychelles.
What policies have been implemented that reflect the ILO's 4 pillars of response
to COVID-19 (protecting people, stimulating the economy, supporting incomes and promoting social dialogue)
and how involved have the social partners been in designing those responses?
Of course, the main policy surrounds public health.
I think that's been very positive for us.
Of course, the involvement with the social partners is fairly limited there,
because it's more of a health crisis.
That's been fairly limited, but it's been very positive
and the intervention has been very strong for Seychelles.
On the economy front, we're looking at wage support that the government has introduced.
We’ve created a company that basically absorbs retrenched workers
and places them in employment in the private sector.
Other fiscal measures around taxation,
of course, on the finance element, moratorium, interest holidays.
Also, we've had policies or schemes that have been formulated to assist the private sector
with regards to financing, especially of working capital.
One of the most important discussions was around
the reopening of our commercial scheduled flights,
which happened on the 1st of August.
There really was a multi-sector approach.
All partners within the tripartite umbrella was extensively involved
in the decision that was took, which was under the chairmanship of the President,
was taken in consensus and in collaboration.
To just point out that we do have weekly meetings with the President,
as private sector organizations, both unions are present.
Like any dialogue and any consultation and discussions,
you have good days and you have bad days.
We have to be honest about that.
There can be much more that we can improve on to have that social dialogue framework.
There is a foundation.
It's based on respect but we do have our moments that we do have a go at each other.
Let's put it this way.
How far are you in preparing for an eventual recovery,
what will recovery look like and what lessons have you learned?
From a recovery perspective, like I mentioned earlier,
that we are no longer looking at a V-shaped recovery.
We’re looking at a much more longer term recovery.
One of the things that we did at the Chamber of Commerce,
with the collaboration of ILO, the EMBO section with Gary Reinhardt and his team,
we put together a framework called the Recovery and Prosperity Framework,
which consisted of surveys and interviews and so on.
Really, this framework looks at seven policy themes,
or seven intervention areas,
which really is to look at the challenges and the impact of COVID.
Here, we're looking at the framework that we've more or less presented to the President,
which is based around how do you effectively deal with the structural changes.
Here, the structural changes is based around digitalization, the future of work,
the whole aspect of social dialogue.
The aspect of how do you deal with international connectivity now,
especially when we see that there’s disruption to global supply chain
and globalization.
It's important that as a jurisdiction, you are looking at that area,
especially in the recovery process,
this recovery framework looks at that,
not to go into too much detail.
But what is important with regards to the eventual recovery,
and with the presidential and parliamentary election looming in Seychelles,
which will be in October of this year,
it is important that any government that wins,
or even governments in other jurisdictions,
that they should be looking much beyond the next election,
or even the election, of two, three elections.
Because the critical issue which we believe at the Chamber of Commerce is,
really how do you unite in terms of the society, which I believe is very, very important.
That you no longer have stakeholders all fighting for very different elements,
but everyone fighting from a national perspective
and everyone is on the same hymn sheet.
Of course, we need in terms of intervention, and ideas, and policy intervention
around the new way of healthcare, which I think it's fundamental,
and the different organizations,
like the Chamber of Commerce have got a very pivotal role to play also in that,
but also, we need to look at the economic front,
we spoke about that,
but also looking at the geopolitical front.
And this is why it's important that there is more leadership
from local but also from these geopolitical or these multilateral organizations
to really help and assist different jurisdictions
and different organizations.
We see the great work that ILO is doing,
especially on the severe strain that a lot of the EMBOs are going through.
It's fundamental that there is these geopolitical discussions
and leadership, global leadership.
I think that's fundamental.
I think this is the way a recovery should look like.
From the lessons that we've learned, it's key that there is that proactive social dialogue,
because like I mentioned, you can only do it with a united front
and with everyone being together.
Find out more: ilo.org/covid19