Informal sector worth 20pc of GDP: Maru

By HELEN TARAWA
THE informal sector is worth around 20 per cent of the country’s Gross Domestic Product, according to National Planning and Monitoring Minister Richard Maru.
Maru told the Apec Business Adviser Council’s (Abac) micro to small medium-sized enterprise and innovation summit in Port Moresby that the Government had made the most comprehensive effort to recognise the small
to medium-sized enterprise sector.
“In 2016, we launched the most comprehensive SME policy (2016-2030) with the target to increase the sector from 50,000 to 500,000 companies by 2030,” Maru said.
He said the key strategies were to provide more access to credit, online registration of companies and lodgement of annual returns, legislative reforms, setting up of the Credit Guarantee Corporation, an increase in micro banks and financial inclusion.
“We transformed the National Development Bank to provide more access to more funding to make far more loans available to the SME sector and even dropped the rates by half to open up more access to people.”