Portugal: One in five companies expects to reduce workforce by end of year
According to a survey presented by the Portuguese business confederation, One in five companies in Portugal expects to reduce the number of workers by the end of the year.
One in five companies in Portugal expects to reduce the number of workers by the end of the year due to the crisis caused by the Covid-19 pandemic, according to a survey presented by CIP – the Portuguese business confederation.
The survey results considered the response of 658 companies mostly from the industry and energy, services and commerce sectors, 75% being micro or small companies.
Regarding the evolution of human resources by the end of the year, 21% of the companies answered that they expect to decrease the number of workers, an average of 27%, while the majority (69%) expect to maintain jobs and 10% estimate to increase the number of workers by 14% on average.
CIP said that the percentage of companies that expect to keep workers is much better than the forecast drop in sales, which will mean an effort by companies to keep jobs in the face of the drop in sales.
“The sales expectations of the responding companies for the next four months are negative compared to 2019,” according to the document prepared in partnership with Marketing FutureCast Lab of the Instituto Universitário de Lisboa (ISCTE), in the scope of the Vital Signals project.
According to the report, 61% of the companies anticipate a reduction in sales in the last four months of the year, with the average expected drop of 39%.
On the other hand, 12% of the companies foresee an increase in sales, by an average of 22%, while 27% anticipate the same sales.
Another “worrying” data, according to CIP, is the percentage of companies thinking about reducing investment in 2021, which reaches 39%, with the expected average reduction being 54%.
On the other hand, 44% of the companies expect to maintain investment in 2021 and 17% anticipate an average increase of 34%.
The barometer also compares the state of orders in the portfolio on 1 September compared to the same month last year revealing that 44% of companies to which this indicator applies (78% of the sample) registered a drop which on average was 40%, while 25% maintained and 9% increased their orders on average by 23%.
