Malawi Government commits to promoting small and medium enterprises

Deputy Governor of the Reserve Bank of Malawi (RBM) William Matambo has expressed government commitment to supporting and promoting micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) to thrive.

Matambo further assured the business community of the government’s commitment to creating a conducive environment for business growth and increasing access to finance, capacity building and financial infrastructural development.

The Deputy Government made the remarks in Mponela, Dowa, on Tuesday when he opened a day-long media orientation on Financial Inclusion and Entrepreneurship Scaling (FinES) Project.

The Malawi Government is implementing FinES Project with financial support from the World Bank to improve financial inclusion through increasing access to financial services, promote entrepreneurships and capabilities of MSMEs in Malawi.

Matambo observed that MSMEs in Malawi face many challenges to thrive in their various entrepreneurial activities, citing lack of capital as the major hindrance.

He said it is against this background that the government rolled out the project to address some of the challenges.

He challenged MSMEs to take full advantage of the facility to create more wealth through access to the cheaper loans that the FInES Project is offering.

“Let us utilise these resources wisely. Remember, “No-one but ourselves will take us out of the bondage of poverty.” Let us encourage the entrepreneurs who obtain these loans to multiply the resources so that when the owner (of the resources) comes back calling for what he gave, we will have a lot of change left in our pockets to live a happier and healthier life,” he said.

In his remarks, FinES Project Manager, Dr. Mark Lungu, disclosed that 33, 000 businesses have been reached with startup packages totaling K32 billion.