Canterbury Businesses Show Resilience Amid Rising Global Concerns

Business Canterbury's latest quarterly business survey reveals a complex economic landscape for local business, with international trade and geopolitical risks emerging as significant concerns while, at the same time, businesses are demonstrating growing confidence in their ability to manage disruption.

Business Canterbury Chief Executive Leeann Watson says, "It's particularly significant, although probably not surprising, that international trade and geopolitical risks have shot up to the 6th spot among local business concerns. These issues have not been major concerns in previous surveys.

"Canterbury businesses have weathered a lot in recent years, and that experience has built a remarkable capacity for adaptation and forward planning, which will help respond to the current global environment and navigate ongoing change and disruption.

The confidence in businesses' own ability to manage disruption has seen its largest increase since we started tracking this in July 2022, with 80% reporting feeling confident.

"This reflects a stronger sense of resilience and being able to respond in a way that will set them up for the future. Businesses are still navigating change but doing it with a mindset that has moved from reacting to anticipating."

"The survey also indicates that earning expectations for the next 12 months remain stable at relatively high levels with 58% reporting feeling optimistic about their financial position.

"However, that’s not to say pressure points have eased. Consumer confidence and demand persist as major obstacles. They are proving to be particularly stubborn, with more than half of respondents identifying them as key concerns - a 17% increase in the proportion of respondents citing them as a top issue compared to last quarter.

"Although the recent 50-basis-point OCR cut is a welcome move that could help ease these pressures, its full impact will take time to filter through.

"In the meantime, productivity and growth constraints, followed by inflationary pressures and interest rates, remain among the top three biggest concerns for businesses. These long-standing challenges require our economy to be back in growth mode, which is taking much longer than anticipated."

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