Survey on Financing and Growth of Small and Medium Enterprises

Detailed information for 2023

The survey is designed to find out what kinds of financing small and medium enterprises are using, and to collect information on recent attempts to obtain new financing. The survey also collects information on barriers to growth, the financial position of small and medium enterprises, the characteristics of ownership and the extent to which the enterprise is involved in innovation and intellectual property.

• Questionnaire(s) and reporting guide(s)
• Description
• Data sources and methodology

Description

The objective of this survey is to collect general characteristics on small- and medium-sized businesses and their financing activities. It collects information on the types of debt, lease and equity financing that small and medium enterprises (SMEs) rely on. Furthermore, it collects information on any recent attempts to obtain new financing. It also collects additional information about circumstances that affect the way these businesses operate.

Statistics Canada is conducting this survey on behalf of a consortium led by Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada. The data obtained from this survey will be used by both the public and private sectors. Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada will use this information to study the availability of financing to SMEs and to recommend policy changes to assist businesses. Other government departments will use this information to develop national and regional programs and for policy planning. Businesses will use this information for market analysis or to compare the performance of their firm with the performance of firms of a similar size within the same industry. Industry associations will use the information for industry performance measurement and for market development, and suppliers of financing for SMEs will use the information to determine gaps in their services.

Subjects

• Business performance and ownership
• Small and medium-sized businesses

Data sources and methodology

Target population

The target population is derived from Statistics Canada's Business Register (BR). The BR is an information database on the Canadian business population and serves as a frame for all Statistics Canada business surveys. It is a structured list of businesses engaged in the production of goods and services in Canada. The following enterprises are excluded to arrive at the target population:

1- Enterprises with 0 employees or with 500 or more employees
2- Enterprises with less than $30,000 in gross revenue
3- Non-profit organizations
4- Joint ventures
5- Government agencies
6- Enterprises in specific industries, identified by the North American Industry Classification System. These industries are: utilities (22); finance and insurance (52); management of companies and enterprises (55); educational services (61); public administration (91); automotive equipment rental and leasing (5321); commercial and industrial machinery and equipment rental and leasing (5324); out-patient care centres (6214); medical and diagnostic laboratories (6215); other ambulatory health care services (6219); general medical and surgical hospitals (6221); psychiatric and substance use hospitals (6222); specialty (except psychiatric and substance use) hospitals (6223); community food and housing, and emergency and other relief services (6242); and private households (814110).

Instrument design

The survey questionnaire is designed by Statistics Canada in collaboration with Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada and its consortium of partners. The Questionnaire Design Resource Centre of Statistics Canada made suggestions to improve the questionnaire and then field-tested the questionnaire with approximately eleven different businesses. The results of those tests were used to further improve the questionnaire.

Sampling

This is a sample survey with a cross-sectional design.

The Business Register (BR) was the starting point for creating the survey frame. The latter was constructed by selecting from the Register all enterprises that met the criteria which defined the target population. The number of enterprises within the target population is 901,516.

The sampling unit was the enterprise. The main population was stratified by age of business, enterprise size, industry and geography. The regions were the Atlantic Canada, Quebec, Ontario, Manitoba and Saskatchewan, Alberta, and British Columbia together with the territories. The industries were based on the 2022 North American Industry Classification System (NAICS), and the size was based on the number of employees of the enterprise. For enterprises less than two years old (start-ups), there were two size categories: 1 to 4 employees and 5 or more employees. For enterprises two years and older, there were four categories: 1 to 4 employees; 5 to 19 employees; 20 to 99 employees and 100 or more employees. For enterprises in Quebec, the largest size group was further divided into two categories: 100 to 249 employees, and 250 or more employees.

The size of the sample selected was determined based on the following:
- The most important variables of interest were proportions (assuming a maximum proportion of 50% for each variable of interest).
- a minimum stratum sample size requirement of 10 units for province level strata and 5 units for strata defined at the sub-province level within Atlantic Canada and Ontario was imposed. For a few strata, this increase is not possible because it would exceed the population size and, therefore, we take all the units.
- Precision targets (standard errors) were specified for certain groupings of strata.
- The sample selection method was simple random sampling without replacement.
- A minimum response rate of 35% for start-ups and 40% for the general population was expected.

The base sample size was 21,704 out of a total of 901,516 units in the survey frame.

In addition to estimates for the base population, estimates for certain special populations were needed. These populations came from lists supplied to Statistics Canada containing units that represented the target population, except for Information and Communication Technologies, Advanced Manufacturing Industries, Advanced Technologies Industries, Agri-Food Industries, and Clean Technologies Industries, where the population came from a pre-specified list of NAICS codes. The sample sizes for each of these sub-populations were:

- Information and Communication Technologies, 400 units selected.
- Advanced Manufacturing Industries enterprises, 250 units selected.
- Advanced Technology Industries enterprises, 250 units selected.
- Agri-food enterprises, 250 units selected.
- Registered charities and non-profits, 1,119 units selected.
- Cooperatives, 650 units selected.
- Users of the Canadian Small Business Financing Program (CSBFP), 1,288 units selected.
- Enterprises that were involved in producing or providing clean technology products or services, 650 units selected from Survey of Environmental Goods and Services.
- Enterprises that were involved in producing or providing clean technology products or services, 675 units selected from the BR in selected NAICS.
- Exporter enterprises, 400 units selected.
- Enterprises that had contracts with Public Services and Procurement Canada (PSPC), 1,350 units selected.

The supplementary lists were not stratified, with the exception of the PSPC list. The PSPC list was stratified by gender and citizenship of owner. In each list, units were selected randomly using the method of simple random sampling without replacement.

Combining the base sample and the samples from the supplementary lists, the final unduplicated size of the sample was 28,725 enterprises.

Seven industry groups were defined, based on NAICS:

Information and communications technologies consists of enterprises coded to NAICS: 3341, 3342, 3343, 3344, 3346, 4173, 5112. 5182, 5415, 8112.

Advanced manufacturing industries consist of enterprises coded to NAICS: 3111 - 3116, 3117, 3118, 3119, 3212, 3219, 3221, 3222, 3251, 3253, 3254, 3259, 3261, 3331, 3332, 3333, 3335, 3339, 3345, 3391,32192, 32221, 32532, 32611, 33243, 33311, 541711, 5612.

Advanced technologies industries consist of enterprises coded to NAICS: 22131, 23711, 32411, 4173, 5111, 5112, 5171, 5172, 5174, 5179, 5182, 5415, 56291, 71, 8112, 92411.

Agri-food industries consists of enterprises coded to NAICS: 111110, 111120, 111130, 111140, 111150, 111160, 111190, 111211, 111219, 111310, 111320, 111330, 111411, 111419, 111421, 111422, 111920, 111930, 111940, 111993, 111994, 111999, 112110, 112120, 112210, 112310, 112320, 112330, 112340, 112391, 112399, 112410, 112420, 112510, 112910, 112920, 112930, 112991, 112999, 114113, 114114, 114210, 115110, 115210, 311111, 311119, 311211, 311214, 311221, 311224, 311225, 311230, 311310, 311340, 311351, 311352, 311410, 311420, 311511, 311515, 311520, 311611, 311614, 311615, 311710, 311811, 311814, 311821, 311824, 311830, 311911, 311911, 311919, 311920, 311930, 311940, 311990, 312110, 312120, 312130, 312140, 325313, 325314, 325320, 333110, 411110, 411120, 411130, 411190, 413110, 413120, 413130, 413140, 413150, 413160, 413190, 413210, 413220, 417110, 418310, 418320, 418390, 445110, 445210, 445220, 445230, 445291, 445292, 445299, 445310, 446191, 493120, 493130.

Clean technologies industries consists of enterprises coded to NAICS: 23, 115, 211, 212, 311, 321, 324, 325, 326, 327, 332, 333, 334, 335, 336, 339, 412, 415, 416, 417, 418, 419, 5112, 518, 541, 5416, 56, 811.

Knowledge-based industries consist of enterprises coded to NAICS: 325410, 333310, 334110, 334210, 334220, 334290, 334310, 334410, 334511, 334512, 335920, 336410, 513211, 513212, 512110, 512190, 516211, 517310, 517410, 517911, 517919, 518210, 541360, 541370, 541514, 541515, 541620, 541690, 541710, 541990.

Tourism consists of enterprises coded to NAICS: 4811, 4812, 4831, 4832, 4851, 4852, 4853, 4854, 4855, 4859, 4871, 4872, 4879, 51213, 532111, 532120, 5615, 7111, 7112, 7115, 7121, 7131, 7132, 71391, 71392, 71393, 71395, 71399, 7211, 7212, 7224, 7225.

Data sources

Data collection for this reference period: 2024-02-22 to 2024-06-24

Responding to this survey is voluntary.

Data are collected directly from survey respondents.

Data collection is conducted by electronic questionnaire (EQ).

View the Questionnaire(s) and reporting guide(s) .