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From Chinwendu Obienyi
Former Vice President of the World Bank, Africa Region and renowned economist, Oby Ezekwesili, has said that Nigeria would need to develop sound policies and structural reforms across crucial sectors in order to foster economic growth in the country.
Ezekwesili made this known at the 5th Anniversary of the Caladium Lagos SME Bootcamp, which was held in Lagos at the weekend.
According to her, the current hostile macro-economic environment is caused mainly by the lack of sound economic policies that will help to provide a level playing field for businesses to grow, particularly the MSMEs that make up to 96 per cent of total businesses in the country and contribute about 50 per cent to the nation’s GDP.
She said, “We must kick-start economic growth and the way to do that is through sound policies across monetary and fiscal policies combined to give you back your macro-economic stability. This would translate to less inflation, less variability in the exchange rate and improve availability of FX.”
She urged the government to engage MSMEs in certain policy formations that would directly or indirectly affect their operations. While speaking on the unimpressive data recently released by Nigerian Bureau of Statistics (NBS), Ezekwesili, noted that inflation, FX rate and poor economic growth were the reason for the country’s current dilemma and urged the government to create an enabling environment for businesses to achieve maximum productivity.
She claimed that the government has been distracted by the proceeds from oil revenue which has essentially undermined the profitability of other sectors in generating foreign exchange for the country.
The former education minister advised that the government must needs to do more in the aspect of unlocking opportunities for the citizens and businesses across other sectors to export their talents and products to earn foreign exchange for the country. This, she said, would make the supply of FX higher than demand and would improve the stability of the Naira.
Addressing the issue of structural reforms, Ezekwesili opined that certain sectors of the Nigerian economy need to be reformed to be viable enough to support economic activities which by extension would improve not only the stability of the economy but also contribute to its growth.
For his own part, the convener and co-founder of Caladium SME Bootcamp, Ayo-Bankole Akintujoye, said that bootcamp was initiated as part of to support Small and Micro Enterprises (SMEs) to acquire business management skills that would ensure growth and make them more sustainable.
He noted that a lot of businesses possess the technical skills but lack management skills required for the running of the business. It is in light of this that he co-founded the bootcamp to fill in that gap.
He also said that the bootcamp provides financial support to many businesses.
“Aside providing management skills for these entrepreneurs, we provide micro grants and incentives to assist in financing their business. So far, we have recorded significant success. We have over 5000 active communities of SMEs, of which we have supported their operations and they have grown secure major partnerships and become recognizable brands”, he said.
