The 2020 National NMSME report authored by the Small and Medium Enterprises Development Agency of Nigeria (SMEDAN) in collaboration with the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), has revealed that the total number of Nano, Micro, Small and Medium scale Enterprises (NMSMEs) operating in the country dropped by about 1.88 million to 39.65 million in 2020, compared to about 41.54 million in 2017,
The sector also witnessed a 3.5 per cent drop in its contributions to Gross Domestic Product (GDP).
The decline, according to the report, is as a result of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, the worsening insecurity in the country as well as the negative impact of the open global competitiveness on local enterprises.
The report, however, stated that the sub-sector’s contribution to employment increased by 3.7 per cent within the review period.
Speaking at the launch of the report in Abuja, the Director General/Chief Executive of SMEDAN, Dr. Dikko Umaru Radda, called for more collective and sustained actions aimed at creating the enabling environment for NMSMEs especially in the areas of funding, compliance, infrastructure, technology and markets.
He said the new survey was necessitated by the need to provide realistic, robust and useful data to economic planners given that the previous reports in 2010, 2013 and 2017, had been outdated.
Radda further pointed out that the absence of data that clearly profiles NMSMEs or adequately explains the peculiar challenges they face in their operating environment, had been a major source of worry to SMEDAN.
He, however, expressed confidence that the revised National Policy on MSMEs which was unveiled recently and the 2020 survey on the sub-sector would provide suitable platform for initiating and implementing special interventions for NMSMEs going forward.
The SMEDAN boss further explained that in a bid to address some of the factors that have negatively impacted the sub-sector, the revised National Policy on NMSMEs had made provision for a national, regional, state and local government coordination mechanism to ensure that the challenges confronting the operators, particularly access to funds, infrastructure, compliance, skills development among others are properly and effectively tackled.
Also, speaking, Statistician-General of the Federation (SGF)/Chief Executive, National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), Simon Harry, said the concept of nano enterprises which hitherto was considered as micro enterprises was introduced.
He said nano referred to enterprises that have only one or two persons engaged in business operations, while the micro-enterprises now refer to those enterprises with three to nine persons engaged in business operations.
Harry pointed out that while MSMEs remained critical to the economy as evidenced by their contributions to GDP, employment and exports over the years, there are still challenges hindering its rapid growth and development.
He listed the dearth of robust, timely and reliable data on MSMEs as one of the key challenges hampering the growth of the sector.
