SMALL BUSINESS SUSTAINABILITY AND REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT: LESSONS LEARNT FROM SECTORAL CHANGES IN CHINA AND THE CZECH REPUBLIC.

Changes in regional policy could affect the development and sustainability of small businesses, which react to external conditions. The main goal of this paper is to propose a regional system of indicators of an assessment of the business environment. The proposed system of indicators reflects the specifics of regions that have undergone sectoral change. The structure of the paper follows a top-down approach, first describing the national and then the regional context of the chosen, somewhat similar, regions within the selected countries. The paper first describes current analytical results from an overall national evaluation of two different countries (Czechia and China) with selected structurally changed regions. Lastly, it proposes a system of indicators. The systematic part of the paper contains a practical case study from one Czech region to illustrate the examined problems and how to connect business needs with regional policy issues. According to the findings, when an entrepreneur is in daily contact with the local government, the quality of the business environment is very important for each of them to exploit a comparative advantage from the market. Proposals are based on a field survey study of 215 entrepreneurs, conducted in the selected Moravian-Silesian region that has undergone sectoral change similar to Shanxi Province today. The results could be applicable as an example of good practice by means of which to evaluate other regions in the same situation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]