Abstract:
The worldwide COVID pandemic of 2020 has made considerable damages to the
Economy of Sri Lanka. This study focuses on the gravity of the health effects and the
consequent impacts on the agricultural activities and connected income patterns of the
workforce in the agricultural sector of the Jaffna Metropolitan area during the post
COVID scenario. The period and population covered in this perspective study is from
2020 to 2022 and the people living in the two DS divisions named Jaffna and Nallur
contained in the Jaffna Municipal Council area and its suburbs named Nallur, Ariyalai,
Thirunelvely and Kokkuvil. The investigation for this study was performed during
March and April of 2023. Secondary data relevant to the population profile and COVID
19-affected sub-population of the study area were retrieved from the records of General
and Health Administrative sources. Primary data on the changing nature of the
agricultural activities and connected changing patterns of income were collected from
the sub-sample of COVID-affected sub-population using a purposive systematic
sampling technique. The primary and secondary data collected were subjected to
analysis in this study for obtaining the results. The contingency tables constructed from
the data were subjected to simple percentage analysis and the extracted relationships
were confirmed using Chi-square statistical tests. This study has shown that the
incidence of COVID pandemic in Jaffna Metropolitan area was 4.53, which was
comparatively higher than 3.33 that of Jaffna District and Sri Lankan national rate 3.03.
Investigations on various types of changed agricultural activities on the workers in 2023
have shown that the work capability in agricultural sector has been severely deteriorated
in the sense that about 35 percent of the workforce has given-up such agricultural
activities. The income patterns were also severely affected, in the sense that 45 to 50
percent of them have commenced receiving lesser income compared to pre-COVID
scenario. However, the vegetable and fruit sellers, small and medium businessmen, have
maintained or increased their income. Hence, we conclude that the effects of COVID
pandemic among the agriculture workforce in Jaffna City were severe than that of the
district and national scenario.
