Resilience of rural businesses in times of crisis: Firm survival during the COVID-19 pandemic in Finland

Abstract

Little is known about the geography of firm survival during COVID-19. We investigated the effect heterogeneity of the pandemic itself and of business support funding by the Finnish government with respect to rural and urban business closures. To do so, we utilised regional data on firm survival, detailed business support funding data and a rural–urban typology for Finland. Results from panel regressions showed that the pandemic had an overall negative impact on businesses in terms of an increased closure rate of about 20–30% during the period 2020q2–2022q4, which was generally higher in urban than rural areas. While the bulk of business support funding from the Finnish government during the pandemic went to urban businesses, COVID-19 funding mitigated the effects of the pandemic on business closures equally across the different rural–urban categories. Counterfactual simulations show that the average closure rate would have been about 10–12% higher during the pandemic if no business support funding schemes would have been implemented.