SME’S: DEVELOPMENT
“It’s going to be a big challenge for her,” Bukula says. “One thing
no other minster has been able to crack is to get the various agencies
to work together in a seamless way. Even when SEDA and SEFA
(formerly Khula and Samaf, now merged) were under the dti, it was
almost impossible to get them to work together.
“It’s not about access to money; the money is there. It’s about
understanding exactly how the system works and getting the
institutions to work together, otherwise you’ll have problems. She’ll
need to sharpen her diplomatic skills,” he says.
Poor strategy means there is currently a great deal of duplication,
with national and provincial agencies often doing the same things,
leading to a waste of resources.
The Department of Finance recently scrapped its SME “set-asides”,
or funding dedicated to small business development, under the logic
that other budgets would cater for SME development in specific
government clusters. But Bukula says these set-asides have shown
great success in other countries where they have been implemented.
Resident executive at the Wits Business School, Thami Mazwai,
says it’s still too early to determine the potential success of the new
ministry.
“It’s not about access
to money; the money is
there.”
“The new minister is still designing her strategy, so it’s difficult to
comment on her potential success,” he says. “However, what has been
happening recently is a lot of activity in the Department of Economic
Development and the dti, as ѡ