Gov’t is committed to supporting MSEs - Minister

Mr Haruna Iddrisu, Minister of Trade and Industry, has reiterated government commitment to supporting Medium and Small Emterprises (MSEs) to improve and promote their businesses.

He has also pledged President John Dramani Mahama's commitment to create a conducive environment for the private sector, and also to promote public private partnership to ensure economic growth.

Mr Iddrisu was speaking at a Business Development Services (BDS) forum organized by the National Board for Small Scale Industries (NBSSI), in collaboration with the Japan International Co-operation Agency (JICA) for its stakeholders and MSEs in Accra.

The BDS forum was held under the theme "Improving Enterprises Productivity and Product Quality through KAIZEN."

KAIZEN is a concept that stimulates productivity improvement as an on-going process in any venture for its betterment.

The Minister said plans are far advanced by government to establish a National Youth Entreprenuers Fund to support Ghanaian youth in entrepreneurship.

Mr Abdul Rahim-Lukman, Executive Director of NBSSI, said the forum aimed at collating the views of participants to improve on the quality and productivity of MSEs in the country.

He said the project is to formulate a strategic model for quality and productivity improvement through strengthening BDS for MSEs.

Mr Lukman said the project which is for a three-year period, started in April 2012 and currently being piloted in the Ashanti Region, aims at developing the capacity of Business Advisory Centres (BACs) to facilitate the BDS.

He said this will build the capacity of the BACs to impact effectively on MSEs at the local level to improve on their product quality and productivity.

Mr Koji Makino, Chief Representative of JICA said the KAIZEN concept is a practice-oriented strategy which can be implemented in the industry to improve businesses in a step-by-step approach.