With Small Business Week in Canada upon us, it is a good time to reflect on how important small business is to our community – it’s so important that without our small businesses would our community even be able to exist?
The impact of small business on the Canadian economy is huge, a few quick facts according to Statistics Canada:
• Small business employed 8.2 million individuals, a whopping 70.5 per cent of all employees working in the private sector.
• 97.9 per cent of businesses in Canada with employees are considered to be small businesses.
It would be easy to continue on with more statistics about the importance of small business to the Canadian economy but let’s look closer to home and the not-so-subtle impact on our day to day lives – especially if we live in a rural community:
• If you live in a rural community it is likely that your last litre of milk or fuel purchase was made at a business owned and operated by a resident of your community.
• If you live in a rural community there is a high likelihood that you or one of your neighbors work for or own a small business.
• If you live in a rural community there is also a high likelihood that many of the small business owners are also involved in other aspects of what makes your community a community including helping with minor sports teams, active in a service club or helping out on a project important to the future of the community as a whole.
The list of impacts small businesses have on our day to day lives could be much longer but hopefully these few points have triggered a moment of thought and a renewed awareness for how the small businesses on Main Street, at the entrances of our communities and in the industrial parks in rural settings are all important contributors to our region as a whole.
- Submitted by Rodger Cole