BY MBONGENI NDLELA
MANZINI – The Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Trade Eswatini continues to help Eswatini Small, Medium and Micro Entreprises (SMME’s) access more than the E14.6 million disbursed by November last year.
The Ministry’s goals for SMME’s were evident in the most recent financial workshop organised by the ministry. The meeting was organised to help SMME’s better understand how to deal with the financials, as well as how to access government and banking finance.
The SMME Director at the Ministry, Meluleki Dlamini, had some good advice for entrepreneurs on how to navigate financing requirements. The Director pointed out the banks have the money needed by SMME’s to finance growth. However, he added, the SMME’s seem to be unable to access it as they should.
In this workshop, Dlamini straightened out a few misconceptions about the bank requirements for SMME finance. One was the misconception that a business needs a guarantor before getting a loan, whereas they can get it after getting the loan. Dlamini highlighted that the whole exercise was meant to help both SMME’s reduce risk and defaults when they get business financing.
SMME’s appreciated the meeting and presented some of their ideas for improving the SMME ecosystem in the country in the Covid-19 era. One SMEE director felt that they should be given opportunities to catch up with compliance requirements as it was difficult to get tenders from the government because of these requirements. The Ministry, through the director, acknowledged the SMME challenges in the bid to improve SMME growth opportunities.
Dlamini also highlighted how this exercise is aligned with one of the Ministry’s MSME National Policy’s eight strategic pillars. The meeting was attended by small businesses and representatives from different business organisations around the country. These organisations reiterated the need for SMME’s to have access to more finance.
The government hopes to disburse more funds to SMME’s this year. By November 2021, the government had disbursed E14.6M out of E45 million allocated to the Youth Enterprise Revolving Fund. A further E6.8 million was disbursed from small guarantee schemes. The government further supported vendors who survive by importing from outside the country with E4.6 million for Covid tests at the borders.
The ministry plans to continue hosting workshops to help SMME’s with growing their businesses and the economy.
