The survey is part of an extensive socio-economic assessment conducted by the United Nations in Uganda. In April 2020, UNCDF in collaboration with Makerere University (College of Business and Management Sciences) and with the support of the Uganda Revenue Authority conducted a business survey of Uganda enterprises the objectives to i) establish the actual and expected impact of COVID-19 on their business operations and ii) provide feedback for the development of policy recommendations and a business relief and recovery package to alleviate the negative impact of COVID-19 on the private sector and accelerate economic recovery.

The measures introduced by the Government of Uganda to contain the COVID-19 pandemic have affected the continued functioning of many companies. As part of a broader socioeconomic
assessment of COVID-19 undertaken by the United Nations in Uganda, UNCDF in cooperation with Makerere University (the College of Business and Management Sciences) and with the support of the Uganda Revenue Authority (URA) conducted in April 2020 a business survey of Ugandan enterprises.

The survey had two primary objectives: (1) to establish the actual and expected impact of COVID-19 on their operations and (2) to provide feedback for development of policy recommendations and a business relief and recovery package to alleviate the negative impact of COVID-19 on the private sector and to accelerate economic recovery. A total of 1012 firms registered in the URA database, almost all of them small and medium enterprises, provided responses.

This survey was complemented with a much smaller survey of 16 off-grid clean energy partners (small and medium companies) of UNCDF's Cleanstart programme to better understand the challenges faced by the industry. Where appropriate, findings of this survey are included in this report.

The results of these two surveys are complementary to the analysis of the informal sector micro
and small enterprises performed by UNCDF and CoBAMS in the framework of the UN socioeconomic assessment. The analysis is based on econometric modelling and provides estimates of the economic impact of COVID-19 on the informal sector of economy in terms of revenues and employment.

Download the Impact of COVID-19 on Ugandan MSMEs and the Survey results
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