This is the second policy note in a series presenting the results from telephone surveys with approximately 400 rice millers in three important rice-growing regions of Myanmar: Ayeyarwady, Bago, and Yangon.

This policy note provides evidence of the immediate impacts of the COVID-19 crisis on farming communities in Myanmar’s Central Dry Zone using baseline data from January 2020 (BL) and followup telephone survey data.

To understand how Myanmar’s crop marketing system has been affected by the COVID-19 crisis, phone interviews were conducted with more than 100 agricultural commodity traders roughly every 30 days from late May until early August 2020.

Agricultural input retailers play a key role in Myanmar’s agri-food system by supplying farmers with fertilizer, seed, pesticides, and other inputs necessary for successful harvests.

It is feared that the COVID-19 pandemic will lead to widespread increases in global poverty and food insecurity and that these negative impacts will concentrate on the most vulnerable segments of the population (Swinnen and McDermott 2020).

Myanmar has been fortunate in thus far having one of the lowest caseloads of COVID-19 per population globally, with under 400 confirmed cases as of early August.

The COVID-19 pandemic has triggered a global economic crisis from which very few countries will be spared.

To understand how Myanmar’s rice value chain has been affected by the COVID-19 crisis, a series of phone interviews are being conducted with rice millers from Ayeyarwady, Bago, and Yangon.

Poultry farmers in Myanmar were interviewed by telephone in early June, late June, early July, and late July 2020 to determine how their businesses were being affected by COVID-19 related restrictions.

This is the second policy note in a series presenting results from rounds of a telephone survey of a sample of retail food shop owners or managers located in two cities in Myanmar – Yangon, the economic center of the country with 4.4 million inhab

Crop traders comprise the mid-stream of Myanmar’s food supply chain, forming important links between farms and food processors, exporters, commodity exchange centers, and urban food markets.

Traditional family owned retail shops are the backbone of Myanmar’s consumer market.

Phone surveys were conducted with input retailers from Shan, Kachin, Bago, Ayeyarwady, Sagaing, and Mandalay between 17 and 20 June and again between 6 and 8 July 2020 to understand and monitor the effects of the COVID-19 crisis on the agricultura

The price of broilers continued to gradually decrease in the second half of July as supply increased – recent prices are close to the 2019 average.