New Gigmetar is here!
COVID-19 has strongly influenced the work dynamics of gig workers from Serbia and the region engaged on global platforms, thereby producing strong oscillations in the supply and demand for gig work, and changing the trends defining most popular knowledge and skills. Using GigmetarTM,and other investigative procedures, the Public Policy Research Center has been intensively monitoring changes in this area from the beginning of the pandemic, in order to, on the basis of collecting new and analyzing existing data on the phenomenon of the digital work, initiate a discussion in the research community and among policy makers about creating and advocating socially sustainable policies in Serbia and the Western Balkans region.
The findings of the research conducted by the CENTER show that tens of thousands of gig workers based in Serbia and South East Europe are active on both general online global platforms such as Upwork, Freelancer, Guru and Fiverr, and specialized platforms, such as Engoo and ABC Tutor. It was a World Bank study from 2015 that first indicated that Serbia was among the leading countries among the providers of this kind of work measured by the number of active gig workers per capita and their share in the workforce. According to the latest data from the OLI Index (August 2020), gig workers from Serbia are listed among the top 15 countries in the world in terms of the number of active gig workers in the observed period.
Having taken into consideration the extreme vulnerability of gig workers, who most often have inadequate employment contracts, some of the countries with numerous gig worker communities have introduced the possibility for these workers to receive unemployment benefits. Unfortunately, this is still not the case with Serbia, although there are clear solutions that could improve their position (see our Collection of papers on this topic).
You can read our reports on the impact of the pandemic on gig workers from Serbia here and here. The latest report about Serbia is here! and the new one about the South East Europe is on this link.
In its research, CENTER relies on its originally designed instrument GigmetarTM, that describes the changes in the digital geography of Serbia and the countries of the region in relation to gender, income and profession. GigmetarTM has emerged as a result of the efforts of the Public Policy Research Center to shed light on the phenomenon of working on online platforms in Serbia and Eastern and Southeastern Europe.
The team behind GigmetarTM are Branka Andjelkovic, Tanja Jakobi, Vladan Ivanovic, Zoran Kalinic, Sonja Lundin and Ljubivoje Radonjic.
Olof Palme International provided initial support in the development of Gigmetar for Serbia, and the support of the Open Society Foundation from Serbia and Berlin enabled the expansion of measurements to countries in the region, as well as further development of monitoring the position of gig workers from Serbia and the region through the project “Gigmetar - how the new economy grows” in the context of the impact of the Covid19 pandemic on the world of platform work.