Tracking Economic Activity in Response to the COVID-19 Crisis Using Nighttime Lights : The Case of Morocco
Over the past decade, nighttime lights have become a widely used proxy for measuring economic activity. This paper examines the potential for high frequency nighttime lights data to provide “near real-time” tracking of the economic impacts of the C...
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| Format: | Working Paper |
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World Bank, Washington, DC
2021
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| Online Access: | http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/948831612451586556/Tracking-Economic-Activity-in-Response-to-the-COVID-19-Crisis-Using-Nighttime-Lights-The-Case-of-Morocco http://hdl.handle.net/10986/35130 |
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okr-10986-351302022-09-20T00:10:46Z Tracking Economic Activity in Response to the COVID-19 Crisis Using Nighttime Lights : The Case of Morocco Roberts, Mark NIGHTTIME LIGHT INTENSITY CORONAVIRUS COVID-19 ECONOMIC ACTIVITY REAL-TIME MONITORING Over the past decade, nighttime lights have become a widely used proxy for measuring economic activity. This paper examines the potential for high frequency nighttime lights data to provide “near real-time” tracking of the economic impacts of the COVID-19 crisis in Morocco. At the national level, there exists a strong correlation between quarterly movements in Morocco’s overall nighttime light intensity and movements in its real GDP. This finding supports the use of lights data to track the economic impacts of the COVID-19 crisis at higher temporal frequencies and at the subnational level, for which GDP data are unavailable. Consistent with large economic impacts of the crisis, Morocco experienced a large drop in the overall intensity of its lights in March 2020, from which it has subsequently struggled to recover, following the country’s first COVID-19 case and the introduction of strict lockdown measures. At the subnational level, while all regions shared in March’s national decline in nighttime light intensity, Rabat – Salé – Kénitra, Tanger – Tetouan – Al Hoceima, and Fès – Meknès suffered much larger declines than others. Since then, the relative effects of the COVID-19 shock across regions have largely persisted. Overall, the results suggest that, at least for Morocco, changes in nighttime lights can help to detect the timing of changes in the direction of real GDP, but caution is needed in using lights data to derive precise quantitative estimates of changes in real GDP. 2021-02-11T17:43:17Z 2021-02-11T17:43:17Z 2021-02 Working Paper http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/948831612451586556/Tracking-Economic-Activity-in-Response-to-the-COVID-19-Crisis-Using-Nighttime-Lights-The-Case-of-Morocco http://hdl.handle.net/10986/35130 English Policy Research Working Paper;No. 9538 CC BY 3.0 IGO http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/igo World Bank World Bank, Washington, DC Publications & Research Publications & Research :: Policy Research Working Paper Middle East and North Africa Morocco |
| repository_type |
Digital Repository |
| institution_category |
Foreign Institution |
| institution |
Digital Repositories |
| building |
World Bank Open Knowledge Repository |
| collection |
World Bank |
| language |
English |
| topic |
NIGHTTIME LIGHT INTENSITY CORONAVIRUS COVID-19 ECONOMIC ACTIVITY REAL-TIME MONITORING |
| spellingShingle |
NIGHTTIME LIGHT INTENSITY CORONAVIRUS COVID-19 ECONOMIC ACTIVITY REAL-TIME MONITORING Roberts, Mark Tracking Economic Activity in Response to the COVID-19 Crisis Using Nighttime Lights : The Case of Morocco |
| geographic_facet |
Middle East and North Africa Morocco |
| relation |
Policy Research Working Paper;No. 9538 |
| description |
Over the past decade, nighttime lights
have become a widely used proxy for measuring economic
activity. This paper examines the potential for high
frequency nighttime lights data to provide “near real-time”
tracking of the economic impacts of the COVID-19 crisis in
Morocco. At the national level, there exists a strong
correlation between quarterly movements in Morocco’s overall
nighttime light intensity and movements in its real GDP.
This finding supports the use of lights data to track the
economic impacts of the COVID-19 crisis at higher temporal
frequencies and at the subnational level, for which GDP data
are unavailable. Consistent with large economic impacts of
the crisis, Morocco experienced a large drop in the overall
intensity of its lights in March 2020, from which it has
subsequently struggled to recover, following the country’s
first COVID-19 case and the introduction of strict lockdown
measures. At the subnational level, while all regions shared
in March’s national decline in nighttime light intensity,
Rabat – Salé – Kénitra, Tanger – Tetouan – Al Hoceima, and
Fès – Meknès suffered much larger declines than others.
Since then, the relative effects of the COVID-19 shock
across regions have largely persisted. Overall, the results
suggest that, at least for Morocco, changes in nighttime
lights can help to detect the timing of changes in the
direction of real GDP, but caution is needed in using lights
data to derive precise quantitative estimates of changes in
real GDP. |
| format |
Working Paper |
| author |
Roberts, Mark |
| author_facet |
Roberts, Mark |
| author_sort |
Roberts, Mark |
| title |
Tracking Economic Activity in Response to the COVID-19 Crisis Using Nighttime Lights : The Case of Morocco |
| title_short |
Tracking Economic Activity in Response to the COVID-19 Crisis Using Nighttime Lights : The Case of Morocco |
| title_full |
Tracking Economic Activity in Response to the COVID-19 Crisis Using Nighttime Lights : The Case of Morocco |
| title_fullStr |
Tracking Economic Activity in Response to the COVID-19 Crisis Using Nighttime Lights : The Case of Morocco |
| title_full_unstemmed |
Tracking Economic Activity in Response to the COVID-19 Crisis Using Nighttime Lights : The Case of Morocco |
| title_sort |
tracking economic activity in response to the covid-19 crisis using nighttime lights : the case of morocco |
| publisher |
World Bank, Washington, DC |
| publishDate |
2021 |
| url |
http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/948831612451586556/Tracking-Economic-Activity-in-Response-to-the-COVID-19-Crisis-Using-Nighttime-Lights-The-Case-of-Morocco http://hdl.handle.net/10986/35130 |
| _version_ |
1764482386884558848 |