The Institute for Economic Research and Policy Consulting (IER) has released the 24-th monthly enterprise survey “Ukrainian business in wartime” for April 2024.
The goal of the project is to quickly collect information on the current state of the economy at the enterprise level.
The field stage of the 24-th wave lasted from April 15 to April 30, 2024.
The enterprise managers compared the work results in April 2024 with March, assessed the indicators at the time of the survey (April 2024), and gave forecasts for the next two, three, or six months, depending on the question. In certain issues (where indicated), the work results were compared with the pre-war period (before February 24, 2022).
This survey uses a panel sample that includes 500+ enterprises located in 21 of 27 regions of Ukraine, including Vinnytsya, Volyn, Dnipropetrovsk, Zhytomyr, Zakarpattya, Zaporizhzhia, Ivano-Frankivsk, Kyiv, Kirovohrad, Lviv, Odesa, Poltava, Rivne, Sumy, Ternopil, Kharkiv, Khmelnytskyy, Cherkasy, Chernivtsi and Chernihiv regions and the Kyiv city.
Main results of the 24-th monthly enterprise survey:
- In April 2024, against the background of increasing danger as an impediment to doing business, the enterprise plans in the long-term perspective remain unchanged, and expectations for the medium and short term are optimistic.
- The Business Activity Recovery Index declined marginally, while the Industrial Confidence Indicator remained unchanged.
- The share of enterprises operating at full capacity has not changed significantly.
- The values of indicators of the current assessment of the business activity at the enterprises and the overall economic environment have slightly decreased, while expectations for the six months are increasing and have one of the highest indicators for the entire survey period.
- Production indicators improved compared to the previous month, and three-month expectations remain positive.
- The weak trend of the employment rate decreasing continues, and difficulties in finding workers are increasing.
- The top three impediments to doing business in wartime have remained the same, but the impediments are changing places.
- “It is unsafe to work” became more important for business and topped the list, followed by “rising prices” and “labor shortage” in second and third place, respectively.
- The share of negative assessments of the government’s economic policy has slightly increased.
