Development of Small Businesses in Russia Close to European Levels

The rate of development of small business in Russia is close to European levels. This was announced on Tuesday by Russian Minister for Anti-Monopoly Policy Ilya Yuzhanov. 'It's been generally assumed that Russian business is underdeveloped, although recent investigations have shown that we have underestimated the level of development of our small businesses', he said.

In commenting on the results of the first in-depth investigation into Russian small and large business carried out in collaboration with the EU, he said that 'received data turned out to be close to European figures'. The difference between the official figures provided by the State Statistics Committee and the data of the investigation was, according to the minister, due to the fact that the EU analysis was carried out using European methods and included the investigations of businesses with less than 150 people and non-corporate companies (owned by an individual and not authorised to act as a single entity in law). 'Non-corporate companies comprise 80% of small and medium businesses in Russia. Each year around 800,000 such companies are registered, so they have to be taken into account', said Yuzhanov.

It was found through the investigations that 37 of every 1000 Russians are small business owners. In Europe, according to the minister, the corresponding figure is between 40 and 61. He also remarked that it is significant that small and medium businesses provide 45% of the country's employment. He said that the figures showing the proportion of small business sales within the total national volume of sales were the most surprising: 40%, in contrast to the previous figure of 20%.

As the leader of the investigation, Nick Van Der Lane announced, the investigations encompassed the following regions: Tversk, Perm and Pskov. The level of development of regional small businesses varied. Fundamental to the investigations were not only the data of the Ministry of Tax and Duty, the Ministry of Finances and the State Statistic Committee, but also the opinions of entrepreneurs themselves, on what hinders them in moving their businesses forward.

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