The number of small and medium enterprises in Moscow had grown by almost 8% in a year
According to the official register of small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs), over the last year the number of SMBs in the capital increased by 7.8 percent and amounted to 868,000 at the beginning of April, said Deputy Moscow Mayor for Economic Policy and Property and Land Relations Vladimir Efimov.
«An enabling environment for the small and medium businesses has been created in Moscow, systemic and anti-crisis support measures are in place. This allows entrepreneurs to develop and quickly adapt to changes in market conditions. Over the year, the number of legal entities – SMBs – in the capital increased by 8.9 percent, and self-employed entrepreneurs - by 6.5 percent, to almost 478,000 and 390,000, respectively, as of the beginning of April this year», – said Vladimir Yefimov.
According to the Department of Economic Policy and Development of the City of Moscow, more than 273,000 SMBs, or 31.5 percent, are engaged in trading. Legal entities mostly operate in wholesale trade sector, while self-employed entrepreneurs prefer retail. Almost 109 thousand small and medium business entities, or 12.5 percent of them, are engaged in professional, scientific and technical activities, another 90.7 thousand, or 10.4 percent, work in the construction sector.
«Over the past 12 months, business has shown good growth, entrepreneurs have enjoyed support from the state and the city, quickly adapted to new conditions and occupied niches that had become vacant. Thus, the growth in the industrial sector amounted to about 6 percent, and in activities related to IT technologies – about 4.5 percent. In the first quarter of 2023 alone, more than 297 million rubles of concessional loans with state support for starting and developing a business were issued, guarantees were issued in the amount of more than 14.3 billion rubles», commented Alexei Fursin, Head of the Department of Entrepreneurship and Innovative Development.
Small and medium businesses are also large employers. According to the national project «Small and medium sized businesses and support of individual entrepreneurial initiatives», at the beginning of April, 3.1 million people worked in this sector, about 36 percent of the total number of employed in the capital. Over the year, their number increased by 4.2 percent compared to April last year. For legal entities, the increase was 3.6 percent, for individual entrepreneurs - 12.9 percent.
