Top banker points to ‘shameful’ Russian GDP imbalance — RT Business News
The country’s small and medium-sized businesses make up only a fifth of the economy
The head of Sber, Russia’s largest public lender, called the low proportion of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in the Russian economy “ashamed.”
Small businesses account for only one-fifth of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP) and “that’s a shame,” Herman Gref said at a meeting of Opora Rossii, a non-governmental organization that represents the interests of SMEs.
He cited the example of China, where SMEs represent between 60% and 70% of the economy, adding that in the United States and Finland, small businesses account for around 60% of GDP, while this figure exceeds 70% in Italy.
In 2021, the contribution of SMEs to Russia’s GDP was 20.3%, according to the national statistics agency Rosstat. Small business output in the Russian economy is expected to increase to 32.5% by 2024 under a series of national programs designed to support SMEs.
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Russia defines small and medium-sized enterprises as businesses that employ fewer than 250 people, have annual revenues of less than two billion rubles ($24.9 million), and follow certain rules of corporate ownership and governance.
Experts say that small businesses in Russia are more exposed to economic headwinds such as weak consumer demand and inflation, as they operate mainly in the retail sector of the economy and rarely export to other countries.
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