itizens around the world are looking primarily to governments to help them restart their economies. However, economic recovery is dependent on how businesses perform, produce, and hire. Chambers and associations exist to be champions for the interests of their member groups and thus are uniquely positioned to understand how the COVID-19 crisis is affecting businesses, identify solutions, and convert them into actionable policy recommendations for governments to catalyze change. Chambers of commerce and business associations thus have the opportunity and responsibility to assume a leadership role in getting the global economy on track.
This is already happening around the globe. Chambers of commerce and business associations in the United States, Kenya, Ukraine, Lebanon, and Venezuela are among those that quickly submitted COVID-19 response policy recommendations and proposals to administrations. These have included specifics on possible stimulus packages, tax breaks, and better banking access for citizens, to name a few ideas. Groups are using a variety of platforms to get their message across: videos and podcast interviews in Egypt, surveys in Slovakia, articles in Ethiopia, and position papers in Yemen.
Business-Led Solutions
Business membership organizations around the world have taken prominent positions on government commissions and task forces to address a variety of issues, including to help formulate the conditions for lockdowns, set parameters around reopening businesses, and design economic recovery strategies. Groups and coalitions of every size and sector, from the Nigeria SME Business-Owners Working Group to the Confederation of Indian Industries, have been articulating agendas to shape the roadmap for reopening economies and resuming economic growth. Meanwhile, businesses are looking for leadership to navigate the crisis and emerge intact and even stronger on the other side, especially the millions of small and medium-sized companies with limited resources.
Advocacy under such extraordinary circumstances has various dimensions and requires careful balancing of interrelated interests in record time. Much of the current COVID-19 response work by chambers and associations has fallen into four categories, which are aligned with core and current functions of membership-based business organizations. As Union of Ukrainian Entrepreneurs Executive Director Kateryna Glazkova recently said, “Associations are made for times like these.”
Policy Advocacy
As the pandemic hit, business organizations around the world have utilized existing networks to perform quick assessments and offer economic policy recommendations and other assistance to governments. Key actions included:
• Tracking needs. The Global Alliance for Trade Facilitation, already conducting projects in Colombia, Brazil, and other countries, had teams poll customs officials about their most urgent supply chain and border customs clearance issues, with a focus on food and medical supplies.
• Coordinating with governments. Business associations in Ukraine facilitated discussions with the central government on how to provide tax relief for businesses.
• Promoting openness. In Lebanon, a “Transparency Saves Lives” campaign by the Lebanese Transparency Association is urging the government to keep charitable work and procurement transparent and incorporate anti-corruption measures.
Information
Chambers and associations should help members and other stakeholders cut through the clutter and curate relevant, timely, and needed updates, as well as analysis, perspective, and guidance. Outreach related to coronavirus:
• Analyzing. In Egypt and Ethiopia, Center for International Private Enterprise (CIPE) staff and partners are releasing economic analyses in news articles and podcasts.
• Updating. On Watch in Turkey uses online and social media platforms to issue current and accurate information about COVID-19 matters. Kenya’s Private Sector Alliance launched a digital portal and toll-free call center for businesses and associations
• Connecting. In Tunisia, the Institut Arabe des Chefs d’Entreprises sends daily email updates to members and policymakers. It also creates informational videos and provides analyses on economic impact and potential solutions.
• Resource sharing. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the world’s largest independent business federation and an affiliate of CIPE, produces frequent web events, workshops, toolkits, and many other resources for businesses to augment its advocacy work.
Services
Chambers and associations must also help entrepreneurs and companies build capacity – and this is more essential than ever as many businesses are under threat of failing. Examples amid COVID-19 include:
• Training. In Jordan, Business and Professional Women-Amman is conducting an online training series for members via Facebook on business and personal development during the crisis.
• Consulting and partnerships. In Georgia, the European Business Association and the HR Professionals Association offer joint webinars and consulting to companies shifting to telework. The Georgian Retailers Association distributed masks, gloves, and hand sanitizer to members, which are mostly small grocery stores that remain open.
• Expanding. In Guatemala, Centro de Investigaciones Economicas Nacionales has increased its online presence to monitor government response to the pandemic and held a press conference on citizen security via Facebook Live.
Corporate Social Responsibility
Chambers and associations are providing leadership and delivering services and resources to their communities. Recent philanthropic efforts:
• Volunteering. In Iraq, volunteers from the Kurdistan Economic Development Organization help local government workers sterilize streets and markets every day.
• Donating. In Lebanon, the Association of Lebanese Industrialists and Beirut Bar Association are providing $100,000 worth of sanitizing supplies to prisons, to help prevent an outbreak within incarcerated populations.
• Coordinating. In Tunisia, the Union of Small and Medium Industries is helping to coordinate business and civic responses in the coastal city of Sfax. Reponses range from possible fabrication of hospital pumps to educational radio segments.
Public-Private Partnerships
The voices of think tanks and other interest groups are also getting louder. Many are helping to collect valuable information and data about the impact of COVID-19 and community needs. For example, The Center for Indonesian Policy Studies is providing analysis on regulatory issues related to coronavirus and food security. Think tank Vérité in Sri Lanka hosted a forum about government response to the coronavirus with select Parliament members. Meanwhile, México Evalúa has been providing analysis to media outlets about the impact of the pandemic on state-owned enterprises in the energy sector.
Governments need input from these civil society organizations to strike the right balance between appropriate restrictions to protect public health and the imperative of economic activity that underpins sustainable livelihoods. The pandemic dramatically upended the terrain for business operations and decision-making, denying businesses and investors the predictable business enabling environment they crave, and we have not seen the end of the crisis yet. While some degree of government intervention is appropriate in most cases, there is a danger that some governments may seek to use the crisis as a cover to exert greater control over market economies. Business advocacy organizations like independent chambers and associations thus find themselves presented with unfamiliar advocacy challenges, all within vastly accelerated timelines that defy normal policymaking cycles.
Shaping the Future
It helps for organizations to have clarity of purpose during times like this. As always, an organization’s mission and strategic plan should guide its work, but a plan is only a platform for the response which needs to be adjusted and adapted to ensure relevance. The most successful organizations are using this crisis as an opportunity to fundamentally revisit how they do business, focusing on what really matters to their members and jettisoning what doesn’t. This brings home the need for good governance within organizations, where directors, in partnership with staff executives, are not just fiduciaries that provide oversight but also bring the critical insights and foresights to set the course for a successful future.
As a recent Boardroom article put it, “In the past years, associations, no matter where they are based, no matter how big or small, have had to face challenges: loss of market share, exponential changes in technology, higher member expectations, increased competition, diverse member markets.” Because of the pandemic, however, almost every sector in every country is in crisis. Think tanks, chambers, and associations are needed now more than ever to support the economic recovery that is so critical to a prosperous future.
a global affairs media network
Associations and Chambers Are Shaping the Post-COVID-19 Future
June 29, 2020
While citizens are looking to governments to restart economies, chambers and associations are best positioned to understand how the COVID-19 crisis is affecting businesses, identify solutions, and convert them into actionable policy recommendations for governments to catalyze change.
C
itizens around the world are looking primarily to governments to help them restart their economies. However, economic recovery is dependent on how businesses perform, produce, and hire. Chambers and associations exist to be champions for the interests of their member groups and thus are uniquely positioned to understand how the COVID-19 crisis is affecting businesses, identify solutions, and convert them into actionable policy recommendations for governments to catalyze change. Chambers of commerce and business associations thus have the opportunity and responsibility to assume a leadership role in getting the global economy on track.
This is already happening around the globe. Chambers of commerce and business associations in the United States, Kenya, Ukraine, Lebanon, and Venezuela are among those that quickly submitted COVID-19 response policy recommendations and proposals to administrations. These have included specifics on possible stimulus packages, tax breaks, and better banking access for citizens, to name a few ideas. Groups are using a variety of platforms to get their message across: videos and podcast interviews in Egypt, surveys in Slovakia, articles in Ethiopia, and position papers in Yemen.
Business-Led Solutions
Business membership organizations around the world have taken prominent positions on government commissions and task forces to address a variety of issues, including to help formulate the conditions for lockdowns, set parameters around reopening businesses, and design economic recovery strategies. Groups and coalitions of every size and sector, from the Nigeria SME Business-Owners Working Group to the Confederation of Indian Industries, have been articulating agendas to shape the roadmap for reopening economies and resuming economic growth. Meanwhile, businesses are looking for leadership to navigate the crisis and emerge intact and even stronger on the other side, especially the millions of small and medium-sized companies with limited resources.
Advocacy under such extraordinary circumstances has various dimensions and requires careful balancing of interrelated interests in record time. Much of the current COVID-19 response work by chambers and associations has fallen into four categories, which are aligned with core and current functions of membership-based business organizations. As Union of Ukrainian Entrepreneurs Executive Director Kateryna Glazkova recently said, “Associations are made for times like these.”
Policy Advocacy
As the pandemic hit, business organizations around the world have utilized existing networks to perform quick assessments and offer economic policy recommendations and other assistance to governments. Key actions included:
• Tracking needs. The Global Alliance for Trade Facilitation, already conducting projects in Colombia, Brazil, and other countries, had teams poll customs officials about their most urgent supply chain and border customs clearance issues, with a focus on food and medical supplies.
• Coordinating with governments. Business associations in Ukraine facilitated discussions with the central government on how to provide tax relief for businesses.
• Promoting openness. In Lebanon, a “Transparency Saves Lives” campaign by the Lebanese Transparency Association is urging the government to keep charitable work and procurement transparent and incorporate anti-corruption measures.
Information
Chambers and associations should help members and other stakeholders cut through the clutter and curate relevant, timely, and needed updates, as well as analysis, perspective, and guidance. Outreach related to coronavirus:
• Analyzing. In Egypt and Ethiopia, Center for International Private Enterprise (CIPE) staff and partners are releasing economic analyses in news articles and podcasts.
• Updating. On Watch in Turkey uses online and social media platforms to issue current and accurate information about COVID-19 matters. Kenya’s Private Sector Alliance launched a digital portal and toll-free call center for businesses and associations
• Connecting. In Tunisia, the Institut Arabe des Chefs d’Entreprises sends daily email updates to members and policymakers. It also creates informational videos and provides analyses on economic impact and potential solutions.
• Resource sharing. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the world’s largest independent business federation and an affiliate of CIPE, produces frequent web events, workshops, toolkits, and many other resources for businesses to augment its advocacy work.
Services
Chambers and associations must also help entrepreneurs and companies build capacity – and this is more essential than ever as many businesses are under threat of failing. Examples amid COVID-19 include:
• Training. In Jordan, Business and Professional Women-Amman is conducting an online training series for members via Facebook on business and personal development during the crisis.
• Consulting and partnerships. In Georgia, the European Business Association and the HR Professionals Association offer joint webinars and consulting to companies shifting to telework. The Georgian Retailers Association distributed masks, gloves, and hand sanitizer to members, which are mostly small grocery stores that remain open.
• Expanding. In Guatemala, Centro de Investigaciones Economicas Nacionales has increased its online presence to monitor government response to the pandemic and held a press conference on citizen security via Facebook Live.
Corporate Social Responsibility
Chambers and associations are providing leadership and delivering services and resources to their communities. Recent philanthropic efforts:
• Volunteering. In Iraq, volunteers from the Kurdistan Economic Development Organization help local government workers sterilize streets and markets every day.
• Donating. In Lebanon, the Association of Lebanese Industrialists and Beirut Bar Association are providing $100,000 worth of sanitizing supplies to prisons, to help prevent an outbreak within incarcerated populations.
• Coordinating. In Tunisia, the Union of Small and Medium Industries is helping to coordinate business and civic responses in the coastal city of Sfax. Reponses range from possible fabrication of hospital pumps to educational radio segments.
Public-Private Partnerships
The voices of think tanks and other interest groups are also getting louder. Many are helping to collect valuable information and data about the impact of COVID-19 and community needs. For example, The Center for Indonesian Policy Studies is providing analysis on regulatory issues related to coronavirus and food security. Think tank Vérité in Sri Lanka hosted a forum about government response to the coronavirus with select Parliament members. Meanwhile, México Evalúa has been providing analysis to media outlets about the impact of the pandemic on state-owned enterprises in the energy sector.
Governments need input from these civil society organizations to strike the right balance between appropriate restrictions to protect public health and the imperative of economic activity that underpins sustainable livelihoods. The pandemic dramatically upended the terrain for business operations and decision-making, denying businesses and investors the predictable business enabling environment they crave, and we have not seen the end of the crisis yet. While some degree of government intervention is appropriate in most cases, there is a danger that some governments may seek to use the crisis as a cover to exert greater control over market economies. Business advocacy organizations like independent chambers and associations thus find themselves presented with unfamiliar advocacy challenges, all within vastly accelerated timelines that defy normal policymaking cycles.
Shaping the Future
It helps for organizations to have clarity of purpose during times like this. As always, an organization’s mission and strategic plan should guide its work, but a plan is only a platform for the response which needs to be adjusted and adapted to ensure relevance. The most successful organizations are using this crisis as an opportunity to fundamentally revisit how they do business, focusing on what really matters to their members and jettisoning what doesn’t. This brings home the need for good governance within organizations, where directors, in partnership with staff executives, are not just fiduciaries that provide oversight but also bring the critical insights and foresights to set the course for a successful future.
As a recent Boardroom article put it, “In the past years, associations, no matter where they are based, no matter how big or small, have had to face challenges: loss of market share, exponential changes in technology, higher member expectations, increased competition, diverse member markets.” Because of the pandemic, however, almost every sector in every country is in crisis. Think tanks, chambers, and associations are needed now more than ever to support the economic recovery that is so critical to a prosperous future.
