Odesa region is among the top 5 regions by the number of new sole proprietors

Odesa region is among the five regions of Ukraine with the largest number of new individual entrepreneurs who have registered since the beginning of 2025.

According to the Opendatabot platform, 5908 new sole proprietorships have opened in the region during this period, which is one of the highest figures in the country.

Odesa region is also the undisputed leader among the southern regions. For comparison, 2,161 new entrepreneurs appeared in Mykolaiv region, and only 689 in Kherson region.

In Ukraine as a whole, Odesa region ranked fifth in terms of the number of newly opened sole proprietorships. Only Kyiv (11.6 thousand), Dnipro (7.8 thousand), Lviv (6.1 thousand), and Kharkiv (5,526) regions are higher.

Despite the positive dynamics in the region, the overall situation in Ukraine is disappointing: since the beginning of the year, almost 38 thousand more sole proprietorships have closed than opened. In total, 81,928 new entrepreneurs were registered across the country, which is 9% less than last year. At the same time, 119,895 people ceased operations, which is 44% more than in the same period in 2024.

On average, for every newly established business, there are one and a half closed ones. For comparison, last year the situation was the opposite - small businesses were growing.

The most popular area among new sole proprietors is retail: almost 21 thousand entrepreneurs chose it. This is followed by programming and IT consulting (over 7 thousand), and wholesale trade (over 6 thousand).

Interestingly, most new businesses are initiated by women - they registered 61% of new individual entrepreneurs, while men registered only 39%.

Danylo Hetmantsev, Chairman of the Committee on Finance, believes that the sharp increase in the number of closed sole proprietorships is due to the return of the mandatory unified social tax for "sleeping" entrepreneurs on January 1, 2025.

Ірина Глухова