Ukrainians working abroad likely face more hardships

The economic consequences of the COVID‑19 pandemic may hit Ukrainians working abroad.

Tightened border controls will block many temporary or seasonal workers from traveling throughout Europe, potentially slashing their incomes, imperiling remittances back to the homeland — which accounted for 8% of Ukraine’s economy last year.

Meanwhile, Ukrainians who live in other countries on a permanent basis said that, while their livelihoods are holding up, they are worried that mass panic and restrictive measures may whittle down their incomes in the near future.

Some 4 million Ukrainians are involved in labor migration, with some 2.7 million working abroad at any one time, according to the Centre for Economic Strategy in Kyiv.
A third are circular migrants, a fifth are short-term migrants and another fifth are long-term migrants. And an estimated 10 percent are illegal. Italy — the hotspot of the COVID‑19 in Europe — is the third most popular destination with 11% of Ukrainian labor migrant workers after Poland (40%) and Russia (25%).

Labor migrants

Dmitry Sologub, the deputy chairman of the National Bank of Ukraine, stated that the pandemic may reduce the volume of remittances from Ukrainian labor migrants.
“We expect a slight decrease in remittances from Ukrainian labor migrants abroad, but it will be relatively smaller than the effect of significantly reduced travel from Ukraine,” he said.

According to the NBU, private transfers to Ukraine totaled $12 billion in 2019, with a lot of it coming from Italy, Poland and other popular destinations for Ukrainian workers. However, experts told the Kyiv Post that this figure doesn’t represent all the money Ukrainian workers send home. For one, a huge sum of foreign currency enters Ukraine unofficially and is not counted. On the other hand, a significant portion of foreign cashflows comes from offshore companies and not labor migrants.

Olga Kupets, a policy professor at the Kyiv School of Economics, said that countries that rely on Ukrainians and other Eastern Europeans for seasonal agricultural work — demand which will start in spring — will suffer economically if border restrictions prevent large-scale labor migration.

“When the time comes for the harvest of strawberries or parsley in Finland, who will gather it?” Kupets said. “If there is no alternative to Ukrainians and Moldovans, it may lead to a collapse for those countries that don’t let them in.”

Ukrainians who travel to Poland for construction work may be facing uncertain times as well. Several Ukrainians told the Kyiv Post through social media that construction projects in Poland will soon be put on hold.

For many Ukrainians traveling to Italy on a temporary basis, the epidemic has hit them hard, said Tania Chopko, a home care worker living permanently near Verona in Northern Italy. She said that many Ukrainian workers who travel to Italy for up to three months are currently trapped behind Italy’s closed borders, unable to return home in spite of their limited visa.

“I don’t know what they are going to do,” Chopko said.

Most Ukrainian employees who travel for temporary work go there on minibuses, which are often associated with semi-legal practices. Unverified social media reports mentioned that some drivers were giving their passengers fever-reducing medication to hide their symptoms and pass border checkpoints. This possibly allowed them to bring the infection from Italy back to Ukraine by hiding symptoms.

Kupets said that part of the blame was on Ukrainians who protest against infected people, frightening them into keeping their illness a secret.

Permanent residents

For more permanent Ukrainian residents of EU countries, the epidemic also created a wave of anxiety.

Ukrainians in Italy have been the hardest hit by the disease, which caused a nationwide lockdown. According to official statistics, close to 250,000 Ukrainians live and work in Italy, though some experts believe that number to be much greater.

Kupets said that most of these workers are women who are working as home attendants and nannies, and demand for their services should remain constant.

But Chopko begs to differ. She sees a devastating blow to Ukrainians’ livelihoods in Italy. Many home care workers, she said, may wait out until their wards’ death from old age, at which point they might move back to Ukraine.

“They don’t see a future here,” she said.

Ukrainians living in Poland had mixed replies. Some were cautiously optimistic, expecting the Polish economy and its Ukrainian participants to ride out the difficult period.

“At the moment, small-sized business has halted, including the real estate market,” said Anna Pysanchyn, who works in real estate. She said many of her clients are delaying the closure of important deals until it is safer.

However, she believes the economy, including the labor and service sectors, will stabilize. “The epidemic does not pose an economic threat to Ukrainians,” Pysanchyn said.
Multiple Ukrainians were upbeat about the healthcare guarantees and paid leave that they can enjoy in the country, which compensates for some of the difficulties of the epidemic and associated health measures.

In particular, due to the closure of children’s institutions, working parents received additional paid leave from the state that both parents can share these days among themselves, said Grisha Polonsky, a financial manager for an oil and gas company in Warsaw. However, one beautician said she was fired after asking her employer about health insurance.

Several Ukrainians added that they can enjoy much better economic opportunities in Poland compared to Ukraine. People who spoke to the Kyiv Post from Poland would not consider returning to Ukraine. But some mentioned that they were worried about being able to visit and return to Poland without problems, following the massive airline cancellations and border closures.

However, others are worried much more. Anna Damorova, for example, who works as a waitress in Warsaw, said the panic has caused a sharp drop in food and restaurant service, with one establishment going from a daily turnover of about 5,000 zloty per day ($1,300) to 1,700 zloty ($430). She’s uncertain about her future if the situation fails to improve.

“They’re talking about closing the businesses,” she said. “There will be firings and us — foreign nationals — will be the first to be fired.”