The ILO has coordinated a damage assessment of floods on jobs, livelihoods and enterprises in Bosnia and Herzegovina. This was part of the Coordinated Recovery Needs Assessment led by the authorities of Bosnia and Herzegovina and supported by the European Union, the United Nations and the World Bank.
During the third week of May heavy rains fell over Bosnia and Herzegovina that caused extreme flooding of several rivers, landslides and mass movements. Urban and rural areas were completely covered with water, cut off and without electricity or communications for several days leading to hundreds of thousands displaced people, job losses and disrupted livelihoods. This might be the most serious natural disaster experienced by Bosnia and Herzegovina in the past 120 years, affecting approximately a third of the country and touching more than one million people, at least one fourth of the population of 3.8 million.
Initial qualitative assessments indicate that the private sector is heavily burdened, particularly micro and small enterprises accounting for up to 92 per cent of Bosnian enterprises. As many companies may be forced to lay-off workers, the already high unemployment and poverty rates may jump even higher.
ILO involvement in the Recovery Needs Assessment (RNA)
Following the government’s request, a Coordinated Recovery Needs Assessment started on 29 May in Sarajevo. It was a joint effort led by the national authorities and supported by the European Union, the United Nations and the World Bank. The RNA allowed to make an initial assessment the impact of floods on the lives of people and essential sectors in the affected areas.
The ILO led the needs assessment in the sector of employment & livelihoods also extending it to enterprises. An ILO team conducted a training on 29-30 May in Sarajevo for government officials to empower them to carry out the assessment. The ILO officials also coordinated the assessment and data collection, developed baseline data forms, in addition to an enterprise survey with supporting analysis tools. Over 50 disaster-affected municipalities received these tools. Random sampling was used as the methodology for data collection. The ILO strongly advocated for the involvement of trade unions and employers’ organizations in data collection and analysis.
A joint ILO/WFP and World Bank team visited 18 different flood-affected enterprises across all entities. As Dragan Radic, ILO Employers’ Specialist explained: “We saw some enterprises with major losses e.g. mine “Sikulje” that has become a 50 meter deep lake with most machinery still flooded. Direct and indirect damages in this mine are estimated at 40 million euro. Whilst the employer avoided dismissals, around 250 workers were sent home and are being paid a base wage at the moment. Furniture factory “FEN-BH” was also completely flooded. Raw materials, ready-made products for export, machines – it was all lost. Estimated damage is 11 million euro. Unfortunately around 130 workers were laid off. Another 800 suppliers connected with FEN-BH in extensive supply chain are also likely to suffer seriously.”
The preliminary data analysis indicates that at the moment no major job losses have been caused by the disaster. However it is hard to anticipate the impact of this disaster on jobs in the mid-term (6-12 months). Export oriented enterprises might lose their markets if they do not recover quickly whilst enterprises working for domestic market are also likely to suffer following the weakening domestic consumption.