These are the results of a new wave of the quarterly survey by the European Business Association, “SMEs in wartime<\/strong>,” among representatives of small and medium-sized businesses who are participants of the Unlimit Ukraine project.<\/span><\/p>\n At the same time, the dynamics of wage payments are somewhat worse. Over the last three months, the number of companies paying full wages has decreased from 62% to 56%. Simultaneously, the percentage of those reducing salary amounts has increased from 16% to 24%. However, there is a slight positive trend in reducing the number of enterprises unable to pay wages and those forced to lay off employees.<\/span><\/p>\n Despite this, the level of support for the armed forces and the population has not decreased, with 48% of entrepreneurs continuing to provide financial support, and 19% supporting their own employees involved in the defense of the country. Another 26% are providing services, and 23% are supplying products to the defenders and those in need.<\/span><\/p>\n Among the companies we surveyed, 37% have employees who have been mobilized into the ranks of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. Specifically, 15% of them account for up to 10% of the company’s conscripted employees, 13% reach 10-20%, 5% reach 20-40%, and 4% have more than 40%. At the same time, one-fifth of the respondents claim that among those mobilized are critical specialists for their company’s operation, such as engineers, electricians, technologists, mechanics, IT specialists, and business owners.<\/span><\/p>\n Assets remain on temporarily occupied territories for 8% of the entrepreneurs we surveyed. These assets mainly include land plots, office and production facilities, equipment, and accounts receivable.<\/span><\/p>\n About a third of entrepreneurs, specifically 31%, report that their businesses have incurred losses directly as a result of the hostilities. The overall losses for businesses due to the war continue to be quite substantial: 44% estimate them to be up to $50,000, 13% in the range of $50,000 to $100,000, and 24% report losses exceeding $100,000.<\/span><\/p>\n Despite significant losses and challenges, Ukrainian entrepreneurs are focusing not only on survival but also on development: 43% of the surveyed SMEs stated that they plan to invest new funds in the development of their own businesses. At the same time, 21% do not plan to do so, and 36% have not yet made a decision.<\/span><\/p>\n\t For reference:<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n The survey was conducted from July 26 to August 14 among individual entrepreneurs who are participants in Unlimit Ukraine, a project of the European Business Association to support small and medium-sized businesses. Thus, 95 entrepreneurs took part in the survey.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" More and more representatives of small and medium-sized businesses are recovering their full operations after significant reductions in activity in 2022. Currently, half of the entrepreneurs surveyed, united by the Unlimit Ukraine project, namely 52%, are working at full capacity. For comparison, in May, 41% were working at full capacity, and a year ago, only […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33544,"featured_media":495403,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false},"categories":[14,4,14111,5],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/eba.com.ua\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/08\/2-10.png\")
<\/p>\n![](\"https:\/\/eba.com.ua\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/Anna_2020.png\")
\n\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\tAnna Derevyanko<\/span>\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\tExecutive Director of the European Business Association<\/span>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\tIt is encouraging to see a positive trend that small businesses are gradually recovering after an extremely challenging 2022. However, we see that many SMEs are still not operating at full capacity - almost half of them. In this situation, it is important to provide all possible support to entrepreneurs and eliminate any administrative or corrupt pressure on SMEs. This still remains a problem for entrepreneurs - 44% believe that corruption is growing, which is unacceptable. All efforts now should be directed towards supporting the survival of businesses and the state.\n\t\t\t<\/blockquote>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t<\/div>\n\n