SME Policy

Reserve Business For Locals

He made these remarks following a Question Without Notice raised by the Member for Moresby North East, John Kaupa in Parliament yesterday.  

Since taking office, the Government has been adamant on encouraging and empowering locals to venture into small to medium businesses.        

However, the competition and presence of Asian businesses, is discouraging many locals the opportunity to grow.

 “Yumi trainim ol mama blong yumi long SME, sampla bisnis we ol lain blong yumi bai wokim, tasol ol Asians i take over.

Cooperative societies to back SME policy

Minster for Commerce and Industry, Wera Mori, said that with just over a decade to reach the Governments target of 500, 000 SME’s by 2030, innovative ideas had to be adopted.

And one of them was to push for cooperative society’s to be boosted.

“You all know that we have a balance of 13 years to 2030 to create 450, 00 SME’s.

“Basically it means we have to be looking at 40, 000 SME’s to meet the target of half a million SME’s by 2030 to create job employment for two million people.

The country’s first SME policy is protectionist: NRI

That is the warning from the country’s think tank, the National Research Institute (NRI) Director Dr Charles Yala.

Launched in February, this is the first blue print endorsed by the National Government to grow the sector to 500,000 small businesses by the year 2030.   

 “SME Policy is wrongly articulating Papua New Guinea business development with protectionist policies,” Dr Yala said.

“That is going to kill foreign investment in the country.

Businesswoman: Small business continue to face hardship

The owner and managing director of After Dark Fashions Katleen Ipi Johnson says getting loans from financial institution has always hindered many small business people to grow.  

“We struggled; access to finance is a problem.

“The equity is very high the small people cannot afford that, we (the Government) talk about creating SME policy but we do not have the capital to start off with.”  

NRI report identifies SME policy priority areas for research in PNG

This was highlighted in the National Research Institute’s (NRI) latest report: “A Scoping Study to Provide an Assessment of SME Policy Priority Areas for Papua New Guinea.” (NRI Discussion Paper 146).

Released on Thursday, this report is relevant for the current Government policy/drive towards SME development as it identifies some priority policies that could address the constraints facing the country’s SME sector.

Bank lends support to SME policy launching

“All financial institutions must collaborate with the Government to help provide access to finance, training and development for local SMEs,” Maru said.

 Maru’s ministry will be launching the country’s first SME Policy and Master Plan this Thursday.

Bank South Pacific is backing the program with K50,000 today in Port Moresby.

The policy details the O’Neill-Dion Government’s plan to support and establish 500,000 SMEs by the year 2030.