| Summary: | As the COVID-19 pandemic has continued to take its toll on human life, businesses in North Macedonia have continued to struggle despite a return to some normalcy. This note examines the state of the private sector in North Macedonia by comparing the performance of businesses during the period of adjustment to the pandemic in April 2021 with the initial impact in September 2020 and the baseline before the crisis, drawing on a standard round of the Enterprise Survey in 2019 and two follow-up surveys in 2020 and 2021. While the second round of the follow-up survey revealed signs of some early-stage recovery, on average firm sales were still worse off than at the outbreak of the pandemic. Small and medium enterprises (SMEs) have been facing difficulties obtaining financing and were more likely to be overdue on their financial obligations than in fall 2020. A quicker and stronger recovery could be promoted through sound policies that aim at increasing access to financing, enhancing digitalization, and improving firm management and human capital, as well as the effective implementation of insolvency procedures
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