The COVID-19 Pandemic Impacts on Manpower Export : An Econometric Analysis of Survival Strategies of Recruiting Agencies in Bangladesh

The COVID-19 outbreak led the governments of many countries to impose restrictions on non-essential travel to countries affected by coronavirus, indefinitely suspending tourism travel, work visas and immigrant visas. Some countries placed a complete travel ban on all forms of inward or outward travel, shutting down all airports in the country. In this context, the main purpose of this study is to review the survival strategies by the international recruiting agencies in the country both triggered and prolonged the recession while trying to save the lives of citizens. In this regards, in the random sample selection process 291 recruiting agents were selected out of total 1,189 active members of Bangladesh Association of International Recruiting Agencies (BAIRA). The econometric model developed is used to assess the relationships between COVID-19 sustainability and the exploratory determinant variables. The results delve out that the only five variables out of twenty-four to survive are owner (s) personal reserve fund, shark loan, sale of other assets and properties, probability of bankruptcy and probably closing business soon. This paper contributes to the literature by showing that financial factors and/or non-economic factors can trigger both a financial and economic meltdown in unprecedented ways. This study also propose a model for investigating sustainability of other business sectors in the same way. Finally, it suggest that in order to protect manpower export sector, the Government of Bangladesh needs to bring under a special program and provide financial and strategic assistance to recruiting agencies in overall market research, exploration and creation