Covid-19 Would Kill Small Business and Raises Joblessness

By Kousalya Manju

The Movement Control Order was extended and some areas were imposed to Enhanced Movement Control Order due to Covid-19 breached to 6988 cases reported by the Government of Malaysia on 1st July 2020.

Pandemic Covid-19 affected the economy of Malaysia, thus the majority of the sectors are suffocating, especially the businesses that are not listed as essential services and are located in Enhanced Movement Control Order areas which remain non operate.

Numerous essential organizations such as restaurants, grocery shops could not earn profit because of lockdown. The non-essential businesses such as stationery shops, are falling apart because of closing down their shops for months yet still have to pay for their rental and other fees.

A busy city, Bukit Bintang during the Enhanced Movement Control Order(EMCO) of Covid-19

Besides, the pandemic of Covid-19 became a disaster to the citizens too. Shutting down organizations and the essential organizations only have to operate from 8:00a.m to 8:00p.m only except for the food and beverage businesses. This causes freezing hiring and laying off workers. In addition, due to the circumstances, the rate of unemployment reached to 4.5% according to the statistics of the Labour Force, Malaysia.

“It was a disaster, the major effect is on the financial aspect, we are terribly facing loses” said Muhammad Najip bin Mohd Basir, a restaureteur operate his business during EMCO.

Since new norms and procedures are established, the expenses are enhanced. According to the restaurateur, it is difficult to attract new customers and lose the regular consumers in such situations.

“We did not have other opportunities than reducing employees, prioritizing essential expenses and decreasing the quantity of the production. This helps to cut our organization’s cost” said Muhammad najip.

Dine-in is strictly prohibited during Enhanced Movement Control Order

Image from Najip’s Restaurant

In addition, one member from a family is only allowed to purchase food during the EMCO period. To overcome this issue, Najip explained that he is using digital tools, especially foodpanda and food grab to enhance customers and boost his business. He also makes changes in the menu such as offering a few combos at a fixed price.

On the other hand, Al Amin Bin Mohamed Ismai who owned a grocery store, Mohamed Ismail Enterprise in Sungai Petani Kedah mentioned that it is difficult to pay for their grocery’s debts and personal debts since Covid-19 began. It affected him and his business terribly even though his place is under Movement Control Order.

The stocks of essential commodities for consumers with affordable price

An image from Al-Amin’s grocery store

His store is an essential service yet he could not earn any profits on this Covid-19. He requested to pay his expenses slowly. The suppliers accepted for slow pay and altered the terms of the paying method. Generally the pays have to be done in 30 days but they extended to 60days.

Amin also stated that customers were reduced purchasing goods by walk-in. The public is terrified of the disease and fewer people are coming out from their houses to purchase goods. Besides, according to the government terms, only one person from a family is allowed to buy households.

Happy customer purchased combo-RM30 and free online delivery

An image of Amin’s regular customer

“We are doing all the promotions on Facebook and creating pages,” said Amin. He implemented new ideas to attract his consumers on social media by advertising his shop and goods.

Amin established consumer's budget combos such as a combo-RM30 which included rice, onions and other essential groceries. This combo is affordable to the customers and many purchase it. As well offers free delivery for online orders and cash on delivery. Therefore, it is flexible for customers to purchase from home and not have to walk into stores.

Furthermore, a 25 years old mechanic from Tapah feels that the new conditions by the Government regarding the operating hours cause difficulties for the overall entrepreneurs to maintain their organizations.

“Ya we operate our business in covid 19 season, we usually operate from 8:00am to 5.00pm” said Adrian Augustine, owner of a mechanic workshop in Tapah, Perak.Since the Covid-19 started, Adrian lost most of his regular customers and hard to get opportunities to get new consumers.

According to Adrian, he could not depend on his own business to pay for the monthly expenses, thus he is doing a part time job to balance his business and for his personal expenses.

“I have been posting some new ads in facebook marketplace, where I offer in-house repairs so customers just have to call me and I go to their house to repair their car,”said Adrian.

On the other side of the coin, “closing non-essential services causes massive tragedy and it is not easy to recover small businesses,” said Florist and event planner Tanushree Shivani who owned a shop at Ampang, Selangor.

She mentioned that she worried about the covid-19 cases increasing despite prohibiting non-essential businesses affecting financial issues and would be relieved if shops were allowed to resume her business.

According to Tanushree, she tried to collaborate with other businesses such as surprise deliveries to maintain her business meanwhile, offering discounts for special days on social media to earn a small number of consumers.

Same goes to Priyatachini, a photographer who owns a studio at Klang Valley. She mentioned that her business could not operate in the EMCO period and it is devastating to her business. Since most of the events are temporarily paused she could not afford to manage her photography business. Hence Priyatachini is trying to work under production industry and editing. She also stated that she could not wait for the pandemic to end.

The crisis situation in Malaysia is challenging most of the citizens, especially small businesses. The Health Ministry of Malaysia has reported that EMCO will end once there is a daily reduction on covid-19 cases. When overall malaysians get their vaccine and cases decrease, all the sectors can resume to operate. Until then, every citizen needs to understand the situation and follow the government's procedure and accept the risk.