LCCI tasks FG to create right environment for MSMEs

The Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI) has charged the Federal Government to pay closer attention to the micro, small and medium enterprise (MSMEs) sector of the economy and provide an enabling business environment for the growth of the operators.

The charge was given by Babatude Ruwase, president of LCCI , during the chamber’s SME 2018 annual seminar, with the theme, ‘Positioning the MSMEs for Development and Global Competitiveness’ in Lagos last Wednesday.

“We join other stakeholders in calling on government to refocus attention on the non-oil sector where the SMEs participate more. I strongly believe that SMEs is the most viable platform for realising our made in Nigeria aspiration,” Ruwase said.

“This requires dedicated and sustained intervention in the sector through various reforms and policies,” he said.

He stated that with the right policy environment and provision of needed infrastructures, Nigerian entrepreneurs would fully contribute to the growth of the economy.

He noted that the government had demonstrated a good level of sensitivity to the plight of the MSMEs, adding however, that the operators were still faced with a number of issues ranging from limited access to finance, high cost of credit, multiple taxation logistics problems amongst others.

Similarly, in his key note address, Abiodun Oladapo, chairman, SME group, LCCI, said that despite the fact that government had created a lot of agencies and quasi government organisation with mandate to provide calculated direct interventions and assistance to support entrepreneurial activities, much more still needed to be done to grow the sector.

“If entrepreneurs are given an enabling and conducive business environment, the MSMEs can significantly transform Nigeria into a sustainable and enviable economy,” Oladapo said.

“If gladdens my heart to note that entrepreneurship initiatives are yielding the desired result such that a large number of private organisations have started to key into it. We need to position our MSMEs for development and global competitiveness,” he added.

The latest report by the Small and Medium Enterprises Development Agency of Nigeria (SMEDAN) shows that the MSMEs sector has 37.1 million operators that have created 84 percent of the country’s total jobs and contributes 48.5 percent to GDP.

According to Yinka Fisher, Lagos coordinator of Small and Medium Scale Enterprises Development Agency of Nigeria (SMEDAN), the Federal Government was addressing some of the challenges facing MSMEs operators in the country.

Fisher urged MSMEs to adopt positive attitude towards doing their business and should not be weighed down by the country’s infrastructural challenges.

Josephine Okojie