Illustrative image (Photo: Reuters) Kuala Lumpur (VNA) – Malaysian small and medium enterprises (SMEs)’s growth contracted by 7.3 percent in 2020 for the first time in the past 17 years, reported the Department of Statistics Malaysia (DOSM).
The DOSM said in a statement that the prolonged health crisis caused by COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 has affected Malaysia's businesses, especially the SMEs.
"The SMEs' GDP for the year 2020 contracted 7.3 percent, higher than the decline in Malaysia's GDP and Non-SMEs GDP which registered negative 5.6 percent and negative 4.6 percent respectively. Since 2004, this was the first time the SMEs performance was lower than Malaysia's GDP and Non-SMEs GDP," it said.
SMEs contributed 38.2 percent to Malaysia's total GDP last year.
According to the DOSM, SMEs GDP for all sectors recorded a negative growth in 2020.
SMEs value added for the services sector decreased 9.2 percent in 2020; construction sector declined by 15.4 percent; manufacturing sector fell 2.9 percent; mining and quarrying sector dropped by 7.1 percent; agriculture sector slipped 0.3 percent./.
