Two in five (42 per cent) Australian businesses are currently accessing support measures such as wage subsidies, deferring loan repayments or renegotiating rental or lease arrangements, to manage the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to data released today by the Australian Bureau of Statistics.
The latest ABS survey on Business Impacts of COVID-19 showed that more than half of medium businesses (53 per cent) are accessing support measures, compared to 42 per cent of small businesses and 38 per cent of large businesses.
Sue-Ellen Luke, Director of Technology, Innovation and Business Characteristics Statistics said: “Businesses were asked how they expect to respond when these measures are no longer available. The most likely actions reported were to defer or cancel investment plans (16 per cent), change quantity of orders (14 per cent) or reduce the size of their workforce (13 per cent).
“One in ten businesses (10 per cent) reported that if support measures were no longer available, they would expect to close the business.”
