NDB spent K554mil on small businesses: Liu

THE National Development Bank (NDB) spent  K554 million in the small-to-medium enterprises (SME) sector in the past eight years, says managing director Moses Liu.
He told the inaugural national agriculture summit in Port Moresby that the bank funded all sectors,  with agriculture getting the most – 29 per cent – of the total grant.
“Agricultural small businesses are the backbone of growth in production, employment and innovation. All stakeholders need to provide an enabling environment for agri-SMEs to grow,” he said.
He said 10 per cent of small businesses were owned by Papua New Guineans.
“The challenge is for 80 per cent of small businesses to be owned by Papua New Guineans in the next 10 to 20 years to generate 70 per cent of Gross Domestic Product,” he said.
He said the demand for small business loans had increased at an average of 20 per cent every year.
“Inadequate funding to the NDB has resulted in 38 per cent (K343 million) approved loans not funded in the last eight years,” he said.
“NDB has come up with an innovative scheme – the district credit scheme – where part of the provincial and district services improvement programme funds are funded into the NDB as security deposits for NDB to lend to local farmers and smallholders.”
Liu said the scheme ensured that government funds for the PSIP and the DSIP were properly accounted for.