Bouncing back from extreme weather events: Some preliminary findings on resilience barriers facing small and medium-sized enterprises

Extreme Weather Events (EWEs) pose unprecedented threats to modern societies and represent a much-debated issue strongly interlinked with current development policies. Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) that constitute a driving force of economic growth, employment and total value-added remain highly vulnerable to and ill-prepared for such environmental perturbations. This study assesses barriers to SMEs’ resilience to EWEs in an attempt to shed light on enabling factors which can define effective SMEs responses to nonlinear environmental stimuli. Relying on an exploratory quantitative survey, the assessment offers essential research findings for practitioners on SME management and sets forth linkages with current mechanisms for policy interventions towards an appropriate resilience agenda for SMEs.