National Virtual Conference on: Poverty and the economic impact of COVID-19

Under the supervision of Pr. Kamel Badari, Rector of the University of Mohamed Boudiaf in M’sila, and the scientific committee of the national conference on: Poverty  and the economic impact of Covid-19, held in the Faculty of Economics, Commercial and Management Science, in partnership with the laboratory of “Economic Strategies and Policies in Algeria”. The final recommendations of this conference have been drafted after the participation of many researchers from national universities and specialized research laboratories as follows:

These recommendations are forwarded to the local authorities of the Province of M’sila; in the person of the Prefect, in order to use it to dealing with this dangerous phenomenon for society. In the framework of cooperation and partnership, for the purpose of the openness of the university on its socio-economic environment.

Scientific committee of the conference:

Honorary president of the conference: Pr. Kamel Badar, Rector of the University of Mohamed Boudiaf – M’sila

General coordinator of the conference: Pr. Beladjouz Hocine, Dean of the faculty of Economics, commercial and management science.

President of the conference: Dr. Bou Tiara Antar.

President of the scientific committee: Dr. Bissar Abdelhakim

President of the organizing committee: Dr. Zitouni Kamel.

Anyone can notice the difficult situation resulted from the two crisis of the decline in oil prices and the spread of the Corona pandemic, which require taking immediate measures and solutions to get out of this critical situation at the lowest costs, therefore we suggest the following recommendations to deal with the phenomenon:

  1. On the national level:

    ·    To keep encouraging solidarity initiatives by charitable societies and civil community endeavors that have been proven effective in mitigating the negative effects of the Corona pandemic,·        To attribute the allowances decided by the President of the Republic to poor families and to the self-employed whose activities were subject to discontinuation,·        These allowances should be distributed through bank windows or post offices, which will help in the financial inclusion of a large segment of citizens who have not previously dealt with financial institutions,·        To adapt to the pandemic by allowing the resumption  of some enterprises activities, which help revitalizing the economics, with extreme caution to the preventive measures established by the supervising authorities,

  • To Enhance the role of “Zakat” to reduce the burden of the general budget concerning the social transfers that represent more than a quarter of the State’s budget.
  1. On the local level (Province of M’sila)

M’sila Province, known for its pastoral nature and its industrial activity, needs special measures, so we present some recommendations:

·        To allow the activity of some trades; where preventive measures against the Coronavirus can be applied, such as public works entrepreneurship or public transport, with strict respect for these procedures,·        Regarding the reduction of income sources for the economic companies that have been subject to the suspension of activity due to the Corona pandemic, it is advised to postpone the payment of contributions to the Social Security Fund and the tax exemption until the resumption of activity when this pandemic recedes,

  • As M’sila is one of the leading provinces in “Zakat”, I recommend strengthening the social and economic role of “Zakat” Fund. The experience of the ritual of “Zakat” as a donation of wealth for the poor, now it can take on a new dimension, which is the protection of the “Zakat” payer. If “Zakat” is a donation for the poor; which is obvious, then the second dimension (protection for the payer) represents institutional innovation, which is the creation of a fund to guarantee bad debts within the “Zakat Fund”.

( Bad debts guarantee sub-fund)

By deducting the price of (12.5%) from the revenues of the fund and allocating to the bank of debtors, which is a legal Quranic right. These resources are used to ease the burden of debts weighing the “Zakat payers”; ie the economic dealers, and thus, “Zakat” becomes a real protection for them, which encourages investors, businessmen and farmers to put their Zakat money into the “Zakat Fund” to enable the latter to play its expected socio-economic role. Thus, “Zakat” becomes a mechanism to preserve productive capital for Zakat payers and to bull them back from bankruptcy.

·        Establish dams to develop agriculture in the region.

•         Investment in the agricultural sector according to the region’s specifities.

The report is submitted to the university rector, to present it to the higher authorities in the country.