FEDERAL GOVERNMENT PLANS TO REDUCE ELECTRICITY TARIFF FOR MSMES

November 24, 2014 23:32:25pm GMT | Views: 81

Olusegun Aganga

WorldStage Newsonline-- The Minister of Industry, Trade and Investment, Olusegun Aganga disclosed yesterday that  to reduce the high cost of business for Nigeria’s Micro,  Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs)  the government is working with the Nigerian Electricity Regulation Commission (NERC) to reduce the electricity tariff for qualifying MSMEs.

Speaking at the opening ceremony of MSMEs Summit in Abuja, Aganga saidthat the government had reduced the cost of business registration with the Corporate Affairs Commission CAC for MSMEs by 60 per cent.

He said, “SMEDAN has increased its footprint from 13 states to being present in all the states  in Nigeria in just five months. This has ensured that we are able to reach all Nigerians in each local government in the country.

"Additionally, SMEDAN has decentralised its operations to ensure 80% of its staff are domiciled in the states and only 20% in the headquarters. This measure has also ensured that our services are spread across the country. We have identified and supporting at least one product in the 774 local government areas of competitive and comparative advantage.

"To this effect,  we have formed over 55,000 MSMEs cooperative society in Nigeria,  and registered them with the Corporate Affairs Commission CAC in order to assist thousands of MSMEs have better access to finance and access to business support services.

"The 2010 MSMEs collaborative survey revealed that the majority of MSMEs particularly the micro enterprises only sell  their products within their local government area. Through NEDEP  we are intervening to broaden market access for Nigerian MSMEs."

The Director General Small and Medium Enterprises Development Agency SMEDAN Bature Umar Masari said “the need to access the contribution of MSME subsector to the Nigerian economy partially instigated the National MSME survey jointly conducted by SMEDAN and the NBS in 2010.

“The report clearly shows that there are over 17million MSMEs operating within the length and breadth of the country.  The survey also evidenced that the 17million MSMEs had a cumulative employment of over 32 million.”