SME Policy Index for Western Balkans and Türkiye 2026 – Economy Profile for North Macedonia

North Macedonia: SME definition and data coverage

SME definition

The classification of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in North Macedonia remains unchanged since the last assessment and is defined by Article 470 of the Law on Trade Companies (Government of the Republic of North Macedonia, 2022[1]). The categories conform to the European Union standard definition of SMEs by employee size but diverge substantially on the financial criteria concerning annual income and assets (European Commission, 2003[2]) (Table 1).

Table 1. Definition of micro, small and medium-sized enterprises in North Macedonia

Category	European Union definition	North Macedonia definition
Micro	< 10 employees ≤ EUR 2 million turnover or balance sheet	< 10 employees ≤ EUR 50 000 gross annual income (both criteria must be met)
Small	< 50 employees ≤ EUR 10 million turnover or balance sheet	< 50 employees < EUR 2 million annual income or < EUR 2 million average total assets (at least two of the three criteria must be met)
Medium-sized	< 250 employees ≤ EUR 50 million turnover or ≤ EUR 43 million balance sheet	< 250 employees < EUR 10 million annual income or < EUR 11 million average total assets (employment criterion mandatory, plus at least one financial criterion)

Notes: All financial thresholds in North Macedonia are expressed in denar equivalent. For medium-sized enterprises, the employment threshold (< 250 employees) is mandatory and must be combined with at least one of the two financial criteria. For small enterprises, at least two of the three criteria must be satisfied. For microenterprises, both the employment and income criteria must be met.

Sources: (Government of the Republic of North Macedonia, 2022[1]); (European Commission, 2003[2]).

SME data coverage

The SME sector overview (see North Macedonia SME sector overview) draws on the core structural business statistics (SBS) published by the State Statistical Office of North Macedonia (SSO) through its MAKSTAT database, supplemented by Eurostat datasets. These sources provide the principal quantitative foundation for the analysis of enterprise structure, sectoral composition, productivity dynamics and export performance. Table 2 summarises the key data dimensions, their availability and currency. The SSO publishes size-disaggregated SBS data with a breakdown into micro, small, medium and large enterprises that conforms to the EU standard definition, and provides cross-tabulations by size class and NACE Rev. 2 sector – enabling the joint analysis of sectoral composition and enterprise scale that underpins much of this chapter. The most recent reference year for SBS data is 2024 (accessed in February 2026); for foreign trade by enterprise characteristics, the latest available year is 2023. Business demography data – enterprise registrations and closures by legal form and economic activity – are available for 2021‑2023 from the SSO’s business register, though they are not disaggregated by enterprise size class. Macroeconomic context indicators (gross domestic product composition, inflation, labour market aggregates) are drawn from MAKSTAT and Eurostat National Accounts and Labour Force Survey databases.

Table 2. Core statistical sources for the SME sector overview, North Macedonia

Data source	Size-class breakdown	Sectoral breakdown	Size × sector cross-tabulation	Time series	Key indicators
Structural business statistics	Yes (micro, small, medium, large)	Yes (NACE Rev. 2)	Yes	2021‑2024	Number of enterprises; number of persons employed; gross value added (and, derivatively, labour productivity)
Foreign trade by enterprise characteristics	Yes (micro, small, medium, large)	Yes (NACE Rev. 2)	Yes	2019‑2023	Number of exporting firms; export value (and, derivatively, average export value per firm and export growth)
Business demography	By legal form (sole proprietor, LLC, etc.)	Yes (NACE Rev. 2)	No	2021‑2023	Number of active firms; enterprise births; enterprise deaths (and, derivatively, net entry)

Note: LLC: limited liability company.

Sources: Data provided by the Statistical Office through the OECD statistical questionnaire, (Eurostat, 2025[3]; 2025[4]).

In addition to the publicly available statistical sources mentioned above, the assessment of individual policy dimensions in this publication relies on a dedicated set of statistical indicators collected through standardised questionnaires administered by the OECD to national counterpart institutions, principally the SSO, the Agency for Support of Entrepreneurship, the Ministry of Economy and Labour, the National Bank, and the Public Procurement Bureau, with supplementary data provided by the Central Registry. The questionnaires cover nine thematic areas corresponding to the policy dimensions of the SME Policy Index, plus a general statistics module on structural business demographics. Of the approximately 160 indicators requested at the economy level, North Macedonia provided data for roughly one-third with meaningful multi-year coverage, with a further set reported as single-year snapshots. Coverage varies considerably across dimensions: the strongest reporting is in public procurement and core SBS, where full or near-full time series are available; the lowest coverage is in bankruptcy proceedings, access to finance and the green economy, where the main questionnaire was largely returned without data. Several cross-cutting gaps are notable: gender-disaggregated business ownership data and SME-specific financial indicators are largely absent across all dimensions, reflecting systemic limitations in the national statistical infrastructure rather than dimension-specific shortfalls. Table 3 summarises the coverage by thematic area.

Table 3. Statistical data coverage by thematic area, North Macedonia

Thematic area	Coverage	Indicators reported	Principal gaps
Structural business statistics	Substantial	Enterprises, employment and value added by size class; sectoral breakdown by NACE Rev. 2 for enterprises, employment and gross value added across most sectors; merchandise exports by enterprise size	Enterprise demography (birth/death rates, survival rates, high-growth firms, gazelles); women-owned enterprises by size class and sector
Entrepreneurial learning and women’s entrepreneurship (Dimension 1)	Partial	Female self-employment rate; women graduating in STEM fields in tertiary and vocational education and training (VET); share of female university graduates – all with full time series	VET work-based learning exposure; women chief executive officers and majority female-owned businesses; female participation in state-funded entrepreneurship programmes and government procurement
Bankruptcy and second chance (Dimension 2)	Limited	Average time and cost of liquidation and reorganisation proceedings (single-year estimates only); supplementary case-level data from the Central Registry	Number and flow of bankruptcy proceedings; non-performing loan ratios (total and SME); debt ratios, liquidity and productivity of failing vs. total SMEs; business-to-business payment delays
Public procurement (Dimension 5b)	Partial	SME share in total value of public contracts; SME participation in electronic tenders; share and value of contracts awarded to foreign operators – all with full time series	Green and social criteria in procurement; SME complaint and resolution rates in procurement disputes; payment delays from public authorities
Access to finance (Dimension 6)	Limited	Outstanding business loans (total and SME share); collateral as share of total lending; bank account penetration	SME interest rate spread and collateral requirements; loan application and rejection rates; credit guarantee volumes; private equity, venture capital, leasing, factoring and crowdfunding activity; fintech indicators
Enterprise skills and innovation (Dimensions 8a and 8b)	Moderate	Job vacancy rate; GERD and BERD (total and SME component); direct government research and development (R&D) funding; long-term unemployment and over-qualification rates; SME training incidence (single observation, 2020)	SME product and process innovation rates; collaborative innovation; intellectual property filing and enforcement by SMEs; social enterprise statistics
Green economy (Dimension 9)	Limited	Main questionnaire returned without data; supplementary worksheets provide CO₂ emissions, environmental economy value added and partial energy consumption data by NACE sector	All SME-specific indicators missing: public support measures for green production, resource efficiency, circularity and renewable energy; adoption of environmental management systems, ecolabels and green products
Internationalisation (Dimension 10)	Partial*	SME export share and total SME export value (2019‑2022 in the questionnaire); average export value per exporting SME (2019 only)	SME goods vs. services export breakdown; government expenditure on export support; export growth rate; global value chain integration indicators; export composition by sector
Digital transformation (Dimension 11)	Moderate	E-commerce sales by enterprise size (full series); ICT security measures and incidents; big data, robotics, 3D printing and Internet of Things adoption; R&D personnel in business; environmental impact of ICT – though most technology adoption indicators are reported as single-year snapshots rather than time series	Basic digital intensity level; business software adoption (ERP, CRM); digital payment acceptance; artificial intelligence technology adoption; public support measures for digital SMEs

Notes: STEM: science, technology, engineering and mathematics; GERD: gross domestic expenditure on research and development; BERD: business expenditure on research and development; ERP: enterprise resource planning; CRM: customer relationship management. Coverage assessment based on data submitted through OECD statistical questionnaires by national counterpart institutions. “Substantial” = a majority of indicators reported with multi-year series; “moderate” = core indicators available but important sub-indicators missing or reported as single-year snapshots only; “partial” = fewer than half of indicators provided with meaningful coverage; “limited” = less than one-quarter of indicators provided or data restricted to single-year estimates. The assessment reflects data as received; some gaps may be addressable through alternative national or international sources.

* For Internationalisation, the questionnaire returned SME export data through 2022; more recent trade-by-enterprise-characteristics data (through 2023) are available from the State Statistical Office foreign trade database and Eurostat and are used in the sector overview above.

The availability of size-disaggregated SBS and foreign trade data provides a solid quantitative basis for analysing SME structure and performance in North Macedonia. However, the limited coverage in areas such as access to finance, bankruptcy procedures and the green economy, together with the absence of gender-disaggregated and SME-specific financial indicators, constrains policymakers’ ability to fully assess the effectiveness of existing SME policies and to identify where adjustments or improvements are needed to better support SME development.