The Impact of COVID-19 Crisis on Medium-sized Enterprises in Serbia
Main Article Content
Abstract
The research objective is to empirically assess the impact of the COVID-19 crisis on the operation of medium-sized enterprises in Serbia. The main research question is how the COVID-19 crisis has affected the operation of medium-sized enterprises in Serbia with focus on major problems faced by these enterprises in times of the state of emergency over the epidemic. Also, considerable research attention is on policy measures to alleviate the negative impact of the COVID-19 outbreak with comparison of measures between Serbia and selected countries. To empirically assess the impact of the COVID-19 crisis on medium-sized enterprises in Serbia, an online survey research was conducted during the period of March and April 2020. The survey results show that the COVID-19 crisis has affected the daily business of medium-sized enterprises in different ways and with varying intensity. Due to the COVID-19 outbreak, 20% of the surveyed enterprises have moved their employees to work from home, while a decline in liquidity and in business capacity utilization, as well as supply chain disruptions have occurred in 16% of enterprises each. Less than 10% of enterprises expressed other problems such as payment of wages, insufficient workforce utilization, reduction in business hours, production disruptions, limited access to resources etc.
Article Details
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
Once the manuscript is accepted for publication, authors shall transfer the copyright to the publisher. If the submitted manuscript is not accepted for printing by the journal, the authors shall retain all their rights. The following rights on the manuscript are transferred to the publisher, including any supplementary materials and any parts, extracts or elements of the manuscript:
- the right to reproduce and distribute the manuscript in printed form, including print-on-demand;
- the right to print prepublications, reprints and special editions of the manuscript;
- the right to translate the manuscript into other languages;
- the right to reproduce the manuscript using photomechanical or similar means including, but not limited to photocopy, and the right to distribute these copies;
- the right to reproduce and distribute the manuscript electronically or optically using and all data carriers or storage media, and especially in machine readable/digitalized form on data carriers such as hard drive, CD-ROM, DVD, Blu-ray Disc (BD), Mini Disc, data tapes, and the right to reproduce and distribute the article via these data carriers;
- the right to store the manuscript in databases, including online databases, as well as the right to transmit the manuscript in all technical systems and modes;
- the right to make the manuscript available to the public or to closed user groups on individual demand, for use on monitors or other readers (including e-books), and in printable form for the user, either via the Internet, online service, or via internal or external networks.
Authors reserve the copyright to published articles and have the right to use the article in the same manner like third parties in accordance with the licence Attribution-Non-Commercial-Non-Derivate 4.0 International (CC BY). Thereby they must quote the basic bibliographic data of the source article published in the journal (authors, article title, journal title, volume, pagination).
References
Bell Brian, Bloom Nicholas, Blundell Jack, and Pistaferr Luigi. (2020). ″Prepare for large wage cuts if you are younger and work in a small firm″. CEPR Policy Portal. https://voxeu.org/article/prepare-large-wage-cuts-if-you-are-younger-and-work-small-firm
Bouey, Jennifer. (2020). "Assessment of COVID-19's Impact on Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises: Implications from China", Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, available at: https://www.rand.org/pubs/testimonies/CT524.html
Bourletidis, Konstantinos, Triantafyllopoulos, Yiannis. (2014). "SMEs Survival in time of Crisis: Strategies, Tactics and Commercial Success Stories", Procedia - Social and Behavioural Sciences, 148: 639 – 644.
Chowdhury, S. R. (2011). "Impact of Global Crisis on Small and Medium Enterprises". Global Business Review, 12(3), 377–399.
Đuričin, Sonja, Beraha Isidora. (2018a). „Promoting the Intensity of Innovative Activities of SMEs in the Republic of Serbia: „Western Balkans Economies in EU Integration”. CEMAFI International Association, Nica, France, 188-201
Đuričin, Sonja, Beraha, Isidora. (2018b). „Financial power and development potential of environmentally responsible medium sized enterprises in the Serbian industrial sector: Sustainable growth and development in small open economies”. Budapest: Institute of World Economics; Centre for Economic and Regional Studies of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, 124-142
He Wen Long, Wu Jian Feng. (2020). "Research Report on Companies’ Survival and Development Strategy During a Novel Coronavirus Epidemic", Beijing: UIBE Press.
Lazarevic-Moravcevic, Marija. (2019). "Characteristics of Marketing Communication Strategy of a Small Enterprise". Economic Analysis, 52(2), 104-112.
Narjoko, Dionisius, Hill, Hal. (2007). “Winners and losers during a deep economic crisis: firm-level evidence from Indonesian manufacturing”, Asian Economic Journal, 21(4): 343-68.
OECD. (2009). "The Impact of the Global Crisis on SME and Entrepreneurship Financing and Policy Responses", available at: https://www.oecd.org/industry/smes/43183090.pdf
OECD. (2017). "Enhancing the Contributions of SMEs in a Global and Digitalised Economy". Meeting of the OECD Council at Ministerial Level Paris, available at: https://www.oecd.org/industry/C-MIN-2017-8-EN.pdf
OECD. (2020). "Tackling Corona virus (COVID-19), Contributing to a Global Effort, SME Policy Responses", available at: www.oecd.org/coronavirus.
Soininen, J., Puumalainen, K., Sjögrén, H., & Syrja, P. (2012). "The impact of global economic crisis on SMEs". Management Research Review, 35(10), 927–944