The commerce sector accounts for around 7,000 authorisations, followed by 3,600 for artisanal enterprises, and nearly 500 for freelancers. Minister for Small- and Medium-sized Enterprises Lex Delles presented a detailed report on Tuesday morning, pointing out the "extraordinary tasks" his ministry was faced with last year.
In 2020, a total of 42,419 applications related to Covid-19 aids were submitted. The state paid out a total of €261 million. Despite an increased workload, the average time to process an application increased only slightly from 9.4 days in 2019 to 9.8 days in 2020.
