Dear Editor,
In an updated fact sheet published by the World Bank on Guyana, dated October 6th, 2022, and last updated on November 2, 2022, the Bank highlighted that “in 2020, 71.6% of Guyanese households had experienced income loss compared to January 2020 levels – with the most severe impact typically found in low-income households”. (See the link to the full report here: https://www.worldbank.org/en/news/factsheet/2020/09/02/the-world-bank-in-guyana).
My contention is that the World Bank’s estimate of 71.6% is farfetched given that there are a number of other factual and methodological considerations that were evidently NOT employed by the Bank.
I have since engaged the Bank’s country representatives and other technical officers to offer some clarification on how they derived this estimate. In response to my concerns, the Bank’s technical team pointed me to the source from which the estimate was used in the Factsheet in respect of the estimated number of households that experienced a loss of income– that is, the COVID-19 socioeconomic online survey conducted by the Inter-American Development Bank (IADB).
Having examined the source of the information and methodology employed by the IADB, the credibility of the WB’s Factsheet is now even more questionable. In this regard, the methodology employed and the findings of IADB’s report to assess the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 across the Caribbean, it was found that 71.6% of the households reported an income loss in April 2020. Careful to note, however, is that the IADB’s survey was based on 1,691 respondents with a mean household size of 5 persons, thus, giving rise to 338 households. This sample size represents 0.23% of the population and 0.15% of the total households in Guyana (2012 census data), respectively.
As a rule of thumb, for surveys of this nature a good maximum sample size is around 10% of the population.
As such, it would appear that the World Bank (WB) grossly misrepresented the IADB’s survey in its updated Factsheet.
Most notably, the WB did not qualify the above statement in its Factsheet, nor did they make any reference to the source of that information which was the IADB’s survey or include any footnote explaining the methodology used by the IADB, and more importantly to clarify that the 71.6% household is not for the entire country; rather it represented the findings from a very small sample.
The underlying problem herein is such that the WB’s Factsheet (which I am contending presented an unrealistic and flawed representation of the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on household income in Guyana) is being utilized as a political tool by the Political Opposition, in particular, to lend credibility to their political narrative which is not grounded in fact or empiricism in relation to the cost-of-living situation, poverty, racial discrimination and the overall economic situation of the country in the context of the level of poverty in Guyana. In fact, it is worth noting that the report is not just being employed to lend credence to their political modus operandi within the domestic political landscape, but to also propagate their political narrative at the highest level of the United States Government in Washington through various lobbying groups that are aligned to the Opposition.
It is for these reasons more so, that I would like to urge the WB’s team to correct and /or qualify the updated 2022 Factsheet on Guyana to avoid it being used in a manner that will bring the bank’s credibility into question.
Furthermore, in view of the concerns highlighted herein in respect of the flawed or unqualified estimate, coupled with the omission of Government’s fiscal policies and programmes implemented since 2020 through 2022, the Factsheet arguably presents a skewed perspective of Guyana. For example, it gives one the impression that the Government did not adequately address the socioeconomic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, which is clearly not the case. Consequently, other stakeholders such as foreign investors who may rely on the credibility and accuracy of such reports by the WB to assess the investment and political risks of Guyana may be subject to a prejudicial view of Guyana thus placing Guyana in a disadvantaged position.
Henceforth, against this background I strongly recommend that the WB seeks to update the Factsheet and in so doing, the WB should consider the impact of the incumbent Government’s intervention through its fiscal policies and programmes implemented since it assumed office in 2020 to combat the socioeconomic impact of the pandemic and the cost-of-living situation in Guyana. These important factors were not considered in the WB’s 2022 updated Factsheet, which would have given a truer picture of the economic situation and a more accurate and realistic “updated Factsheet” on Guyana for 2022. To demonstrate this argument, the fiscal policies and other measures implemented by the Government in response to the rising cost of living situation in Guyana, cumulatively from 2020 through 2022 amounted to over G$200 billion inclusive of foregone revenues to the national treasury.
One would recall that this is not the first time the Bank is having this issue wherein the credibility of its work is questionable. In September 2021, by the Bank’s own admission, the World Bank issued a statement notifying member countries of its decision to discontinue the “Doing Business Report”. According to the Bank, the reason for this was stated as follows:
“After data irregularities on Doing Business 2018 and 2020 were reported internally in June 2020, World Bank management paused the next Doing Business report and initiated a series of reviews and audits of the report and its methodology. In addition, because the internal reports raised ethical matters, including the conduct of former Board officials as well as current and/or former Bank staff, management reported the allegations to the Bank’s appropriate internal accountability mechanisms.” See the link to the full statement here: https://www.worldbank.org/en/news/statement/2021/09/16/world-bank-group-to-discontinue-doing-business-report.
It would appear that the above issue still persists regarding the World Bank’s internal methodology when it comes to these type of country assessments. In this respect, there are a number of weaknesses embodied within the Bank’s latest fact sheet on Guyana, which are unsubstantiated, and more importantly, ignored a series of developments from 2020 to present. This report, therefore, seeks to address these issues and highlight a series of considerations, and updated information that the Bank could have obtained from the relevant authorities, with the view to present a more accurate assessment of the poverty situation in Guyana.
With these in mind, the WB ought to have qualified the statement in its Factsheet where it asserted that 71.6% of households experienced a loss of income, cite the source of the information and a brief explanation on the methodology. The WB’s failure in so doing has led to the updated Factsheet being misconstrued by certain stakeholders across the political spectrum, inter alia, in presenting an unrealistic economic perspective of the country.
It should be of sufficient concern to the WB that their use of an estimate from the IADB’s survey without a proper qualifying statement and citation in the Factsheet, any layperson would interpret it to mean that 71.6% of the total household in the country was affected by a loss of income which was most certainly not the case.
Suffice it to state, since I would have pointed out this unethical flaw with the WB’s Factsheet following their response on the source of the estimate, I am still awaiting a response from the team on a rescheduled meeting they promised to facilitate with me to discuss the concerns highlighted herein.
Yours faithfully,
Joel Bhagwandin
Director
SphereX Analytics