— says chair of Small Business Council

THE Small Business Bureau (SBB) will this year implement a National Entrepreneurial Strategy and Policy as it intensifies focus on entrepreneurship.

According to Chairperson of the Small Business Council, Valrie Grant, many local entrepreneurs can be classified as “necessity entrepreneurs”.
This, she said, simply means that they are pushed into entrepreneurship because they have no other alternative. According to Grant, this represents the scarcity of decent wage-labour opportunities in the economy.

The SBB as such intends to ensure that entrepreneurs are innovative and guided by a national strategy or a direct policy to support entrepreneurship.
“This is something we have been working on since last year and we will continue to work on it this year and we will bring the strategy to fruition this year,” said Grant, adding that they intend to complete it by the third quarter of this year.

Based on research and statistics, SBB was able to conclude that the strategy needs to be inclusive because the Government has an important role to play in ensuring there is an overarching policy to govern how entrepreneurship takes place.
Vice Chairperson of the Small Business Council, Parbatie Khan, expressed similar views, noting that SBB requires a cohesive effort among Government, private sector and small businesses.

“Without a guiding principle, everybody will do what they want and without any regard… SBB will put together a roadmap to provide a guide to make sure entrepreneurship reaches the grassroots,” Grant explained.

The SBB will work with the private sector and academic institutions in order to regulate the terms of the policies and incentives of the strategy which will be aligned to the overall national development strategy and other private sector development strategies
Grant also said that the council is trying to manage the interaction with other stakeholders in order to create policy synergies that will help to strengthen institutional framework and promote capacity building.

One area she said that needs strengthening is measuring of results. The SBB last year improved its monitoring and evaluation process.
“Because of that we were able to monitor our programmes such as Youth base 592 skills training for youths; in-school programmes and the recent Guyana Sugar Corporation (GuySuCo) intervention,” she said.

The SBB intends to work with the same pace to implement and monitor work planned for 2018, given that their main thrust of its 2018 budget is to create employment; encourage and develop green technology innovation; and introduce more acceleration or incubator services.

“It is necessary to invest in entrepreneurs because they play a crucial role in the development of a vibrant, formal, small and medium size business sector… more small businesses also enhance productivity, growth and can help find practical business solutions to social and environmental challenges, including climate change,” Grant said.