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Govt tasks SMEs to capitalise on Sullivan Summit
2008-03-29 09:21:17
By A Correspondent
Domestic export oriented Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) are reminded to capitalise on the forthcoming Leon Sullivan Summit slated for Arusha in June by striking as many deals as possible.
The Summit will be attended by over 4000 business people mostly Afro Americans and some African Heads of States and government, senior government executives and Africans business people.
The Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Industry, Commerce and Marketing, Dr. Stergomena Tax-Bamwenda said yesterday in Dar es Salaam that the event becomes a perfect avenue for meeting global businesses.
She has told SMEs that they could best position themselves because even in America, SMEs are amply available and would like to partner with our home-based SMEs.
The PS was opening a one day dissemination workshop that dwelt on the findings of the fruit and vegetable supply chain analysis.
In the event that local export SMEs fail to make full use of the opportunities to be opened up by the Summit, counterparts from neighbouring countries would take over.
Dr Tax-Bamwenda was represented at the event by the Director of Small and Medium Enterprises in the Ministry, Desystant Massawe.
Besides hunting for partnerships and joint venture opportunities with the Americans, SMEs should also be ready and able to exhibit before delegates local products of the top range.
Speaking about the Small and Medium Enterprises Competitiveness Facility (SCF) efforts to fund SMEs` efforts to access international markets and technology, the PS hailed SCF for partly financing costs incurred by export oriented SMEs in search of technology and global markets.
``The government is happy with SCF\'s three years performance and looks forward that during the Facility`s phase two which starts this July it will better and expand its services to benefit more SMEs in the country,`` she noted.
She said that the report which was to be disseminated at the workshop was of particular interest in the sense that it would enable various actors to come up with more focused and demand driven interventions to address the specific needs of the fruit and vegetable sector with special attention on market access.
Participants were engaged in discussing the research findings and suggest measures to be put in place to upgrade the position of SMEs in the country.
The SME development policy, she said, recognises the need for various players in assisting local small producers to improve their businesses and its effective implementation demands smart partnership not only between public and private sectors, but also between public-private and development partners.
The SCF Chairman, Ibrahim Seushi, said SCF contracted a consulting firm to look into means of promoting fruit and vegetable supply chain and point at problems affecting attainment of that goal.
``Today we are going to be told on the problems blocking a formation of a value chain in the fruit and vegetable sector and solutions to the hindrances. As SCF we feel we have done our job and we are determined to take the problems further to ensure the sector operates and grows smoothly,`` he said.
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