18 September 2008
Small businesses are the engine of growth, says Government T he Ministry of Trade and Industry's small and medium enterprise (SME) bank has provided guarantee covers to 787 entrepreneurs countrywide worth N$70.6 million in loans through local banks.
The Small Business Credit Guarantee Trust (SBCGT) was transformed into the SME bank to improve accessibility of SMEs to get finance, and to act as a catalyst to encourage lending institutions in the private sector to provide financing to the SME sector.
At the launch of the 'Market Study on Business Development Services Provided to SMEs in Namibia' on Tuesday evening, Deputy Trade and Industry Minister Teopolina Mushelenga indicated that through these loans, more than 4 530 permanent jobs were created.
According to the deputy minister, government has acknowledged that access to finance, technology, production inputs, market access and industrial premises posed the biggest challenge to the growth of small businesses and emerging enterprises in the country.
The government believes that SMEs in particular and the private sector in general are the engines of economic growth.
It is equally true that Namibia will not achieve the ambitious growth and employment targets set out in Vision 2030 without a strong and vibrant private sector, she stressed.
It is against this background that government has designed and developed SME-targeted programmes and schemes with an emphasis on accelerating the pace of creating sustainable self-employment opportunities and to alleviate poverty.
So far, Government has constructed four industrial parks countrywide, nine common facility centres, four slaughterhouses, 25 SME business parks and 11 residential houses at Oshikango.
These parks translated into 492 actual operational business enterprises that provided over 3 727 permanent and 7 275 temporary jobs during the construction phase.
As over 60 per cent of entrepreneurs occupying these industrial premises are women, Mushelenga expressed hope that the same will prevail at other parks that will be constructed in the near future at Okalongo and Okongo in the Omusati and Ohangwena regions, respectively.
She added that the government will continue to strive for an enabling and conducive environment for the development and promotion of SMEs, as well as the private sector in Namibia.
Nampa
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