Poor business plan and failure of owners of small businesses to embrace current technology platforms have been identified as reasons stifling the growth of Micro Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) in the country.
Speakers at BusinessDay conference on Tuesday with the theme ‘Nigeria Market Access for SMEs’, which was organised in conjunction with Small and Medium Enterprises Development Agency of Nigeria (SMEDAN), observed that a lot of small business owners in the country lack the requisite knowledge and skills to package presentable business plans that will help them access loans from banks or even access loans from Federal Government agencies.
This development, they observed, is worrisome especially coming at a time that the Federal Government considered it important to inaugurate a National Council on Micro, Small and Medium scale Enterprises.
The speakers noted that MSMEs are the pivot of economic development, wondering why MSMEs have not tackled the issue of how to access funds so that they can better grow their businesses.
Bature Masari, director general, SMEDAN, in his opening remark at the event observed that getting a good business plan has continued to pose a challenge for MSMEs.
The director general, who was represented by Majiyagbe Olalekan, center manager, SMEDAN, pointed out that a well-packaged business plan is what banks look at for when deciding to grant loans to businesses.
He urged owners of small businesses to improve on that aspect if they ever hope to grow their businesses from the level they presently operate.
“As a business owner, you can’t take a baby business plan to a bank and expect to get loan, you need to learn ways to write a well-packaged business plan”, he said.
Dayo Bankole-Hameed, head, retail credit, Union Bank Plc, in his presentation said globally, SMEs are regarded as the engine of growth, potentially a viable sector in spite of challenges, stressing that they constitute a large part of the economy in most developed countries.
Bankole-Hameed said the reason majority of businesses fail to improve on their growth potential in Nigeria is because they are hampered by government policy, finance and lack of infrastructure.
He, however, revealed that Union Bank Plc has positioned itself in the SME sector to ensure that there is improvement in the sub-sector’s performance.
According to him, “To achieve this objective, the bank has provided over the years financial services to the SME sector in Nigeria. UBN has always been supportive dating back to 1978, actively participated in Federal Government and CBN funded development programmes”.
