Barcelona, 30 March 2020.- The Catalan Association of Family Businesses (ASCEF), which comprises over 100 companies representing the Catalan business community, has called on the Spanish government to apply economic measures that improve company liquidity at a time when the halting of non-essential activities due to the coronavirus crisis is placing family businesses as a whole in a “very difficult” situation.

The ASCEF believes that there is a need for immediate economic measures, for Social Security contributions to be suspended without limitations on time or company size, and a moratorium on tax payments. It has also asked the State to take over payment of employees’ recoverable paid leave. “For every company, large and small, a lack of revenue due to the cessation of their activity, which had already been reduced by the decline of the economy as a whole, will deprive many of the money to make payments,” said Amadeu Jori, the President of ASCEF. In this regard, all the business organisations (Spanish Confederation of Business Organisations (CEOE), Spanish Confederation of Small and Medium Enterprises (Cepyme), Family Business Institute (IEF) and Fomento del Trabajo) have lodged similar requests.

Family businesses in Catalonia account for 88.3% of all private sector companies, contribute 69% of Gross Value Added (GVA) and generate 76% of private sector jobs. “Catalan family businesses are making every effort possible, strengthening the values that have enabled them to endure, such as their commitment to business projects and entrepreneurial leadership despite the difficulties, but everything is happening so quickly that exceptional measures of support are called for.”

The ASCEF has never questioned the lockdown that, for health reasons, the Spanish government has implemented in order to fight the Covid-19 pandemic “because it is evident that people are what matter most.”