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Māori business leaders are feeling the pressure.
The latest Māori Business Sector Report from accounting firm BDO says since May over half – 54 percent – of Māori business leaders say that they had been feeling less mentally healthy than normal.
They score an average of 64 out of 100 on the World Health Organisation wellbeing index.
Despite that score, 83 percent say they expect to feel positive about their business performance all or most of the time in six months’ time.
This was 16 percent higher than the whole-of-business average.
Māori business leaders also had a much more positive outlook for future life satisfaction, with 80 percent saying that they expect to feel satisfied with life all or most of the time, which is 8 percent higher than the whole-of-business average.
BDO Māori business sector leader Angela Edwards says some sectors are doing particularly well, which aligns with who got funding in Budget 2022, including iwi organisations working in social services and health and social housing providers.
Māori organisations have a strong base in primary producing, and those in food, farming and forestry continue to do well.
Cash flow was cited by Māori business leaders as the number one cause for declining wellbeing, with 36% of those who had been feeling less mentally healthy than normal saying that cash flow was causing this, followed by COVID-19 (35%) and workload being too high (31%).
Not having enough people to rely on for support came fourth at 27% and business’ financial performance challenges fifth at 26%.
Those citing the impacts of COVID-19 was causing them to feel less mentally healthy have decreased by 20% since the last wave of research was carried out in May – when COVID-19 was the leading cause. This indicates that Māori businesses have been able to return to a degree of normality after the pandemic.
Two-thirds of respondents said that they were feeling somewhat or significantly better than when their business was facing the most disruption from COVID-19.
Cash flow, however, has increased by 20%, with inflation and economic instability causing key challenges for Māori business leaders.
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