Mobile survey finds economic disruption in Liberia, Sierra Leone after Ebola outbreak

The Ebola outbreak in West Africa severely disrupted the economies of both Liberia and Sierra Leone, according to a survey released on Sept. 30 by GeoPoll, a mobile survey platform, and FHI 360, a human development organization.

From January to June of this year, a survey was distributed to a total of 2,000 participants via SMS messages throughout every district in both countries.
 
In Liberia, more than 60 percent of respondents said that their income levels had fallen since June 2014, and in Sierra Leone, more than 70 percent concurred with their Liberian counterparts over the same time period.

Of the survey, GeoPoll Director of Client Business Development Amy Sweeney told West Africa News, "The mobile phone is a valuable tool in its ability to collect data from remote or disaster-stricken areas. For this project we conducted 30,000 mobile surveys across Sierra Leone and Liberia, demonstrating the power and reach of mobile technology in its delivery of real-time, actionable data."  

Yet there is a silver lining: Even though both countries' citizens faced great hardship during the Ebola outbreak, they still remain optimistic about their nations' abilities to bounce back, with 70 percent of Liberians and 62 percent of Sierra Leoneons "expressing confidence" about the future. The most optimistic group of all, though, are youths between the ages of 15 and 24; 74 percent of them believe that their countries' job markets will improve in the next six months.