Govt hopeful partnership will help deliver SME incentive plans

THE government will look at partnering with financial institutions to deliver some of its small to medium enterprise (SME) and micro small to medium enterprise (MSME) policies and incentive plans, says Prime Minister James Marape.
He said they would look to partner with the National Development Bank (NDB) and Bank South Pacific (BSP) to keep allocated funds for SMEs to access. “Different metric and criteria will be put in place and we will package funding assistance in the 2020 budget,” he said.
“We will tailor make programmes and if NDB is ready and has the ability to handle these programmes for us, we will go to NDB.
“If NDB is not responsive enough then that funding will go to BSP.
“The funding will be parked somewhere either at NDB or BSP, so that SMEs can tap into that scheme and borrow from and grow their business.”
Marape said currently the government was in a partnership with BSP for the first home buyer loan service and would look to extend that partnership into the area of SMEs as well.
“Right now we are partnering BSP in the space of first-time home buyers for citizens and that is tracking quite successfully at a rate of four per cent over a 10-year period,” he said.
“That is one of the best programmes, globally speaking, that I am proud of and that was initiated by the former prime minister.
“I would like to go one better for SME and that is to give softer more long term concessional borrowing looking at possibly a four per cent and three per cent rate over an extended period for SMEs and MSMEs.”
Marape said that SMEs and MSMEs can get access to these funds as long as they show evidence that they have a good tax paying track record and their business does not impede the economy of the country.
“As a government we would like to give incentives that are performance-based.”