A MYOB survey showed that small-business owners right around New Zealand are cutting back on holidays, with owners in some regions taking a lot less time off.
Otago-Southland has been shown as one of the hardest-working regions in the country.
The MYOB business monitor, a regular survey of 1000 business owners, asked respondents how often they worked extra hours or gave up taking holidays in order to get work done.
MYOB general manager Julian Smith said the survey illustrated the level of hard work and sacrifice that went into operating a small business.
"As these results show, small-business owners are incredibly hard-working. All over the country, we are seeing people giving up holidays or time with their families to put in the hours needed to make their business succeed," he said.
Otago-Southland Employers' Association chief executive John Scandrett told the Otago Daily Times that within the survey, a relatively high proportion of the small businesses approached were in the hospitality sector.
"If we therefore step back and recognise that here in Otago and Southland, tourist-focused accommodation and catering operators have for some months seen lower visitor numbers. As a consequence, they have been under financial pressure and it is understandable that additional working hours might well be needed to protect a viable business base."
The survey showed that 65% of Bay of Plenty small-business owners were taking fewer holidays in order to keep their businesses running, compared with 64% of Otago-Southland owners.
Mr Scandrett said the Bay of Plenty figures were tracking close to the Otago-Southland results. He assumed the rationale for the Bay of Plenty figures was in some way connected to the grounding of Rena and the flow-on disruptions small-business owners in the region had experienced.
The survey made reference to the fact it was predominantly provincial areas where small-business operators worked the hardest. That would tend to add weight to the Otago-Southland result.
"But there is an overall lack of sector detail and who can really say that it is not all business operators who have had to expand working hours to remain profitable.
"The survey gives little definition around what constitutes hardest-working or small-business size measurement," he said.
