COVID-19 led to prolonged school closures to varying degrees across developing Asia. These disruptions will affect the skills students acquire and eventually their productivity as future workers. Various distance learning strategies are being used, but they are only partially effective. Thus, school closures come at the price of learning. Learning losses range from 8% of a learning-adjusted year of schooling in the Pacific, where schools have mostly stayed open, to 55% in South Asia, where school closures have been longest. Learning losses will reduce the future productivity and lifetime earnings of affected students. The present value of these losses is estimated at $1.25 trillion for developing Asia, equivalent to 5.4% of the region’s 2020 gross domestic product (GDP).
Author(s): Asian Development Bank
Year Published: 2021
Language: English
Country: Asia-Pacific
