ArmInfo. A small and medium business development bank (SME) will be established in Armenia. Armenian Minister of Economy Vahan Kerobyan announced this during his welcoming speech at the 2nd forum of the Buy Armenian platform.
He noted that it is quite easy to establish a small business in Armenia, but the main problem is that it is quite difficult to develop it. According to the minister, this is due to a number of obstacles. In this regard, first of all, he noted the insufficient level of education and competencies. <Development requires additional knowledge, skills, and here we understand that the government has a lot of work to do in the context of the development of entrepreneurial education>,he said.
Among other obstacles, Kerobian also considered the tax system. In this context, he indicated that today it is quite difficult to convince people from one taxation system to switch to another. "And here we have a plan," the minister noted, recalling that out of 40 small enterprises in Europe has a development perspective, while in Armenia - 1 out of 500 micro-enterprises.
According to Kerobyan, the last and most important obstacle is the lack of ambition among entrepreneurs. According to him, small business is satisfied with a small income instead of trying to develop as much as possible.
As the minister explained, the establishment of the SME Development Bank will help businesses at the initial stage - in the most vulnerable period, after which it will be easier to develop. In particular, in the Development Bank, small businesses with a good idea will go through a training stage with the involvement of mentors, coaches, after which a business plan will be drawn up, which will be sent to banks for partial financing, the rest of the funds will be provided by the SME Development Bank. Kerobyan expressed hope that the government will accept this project in the near future.
It should be noted that according to the data of the Ministry of Economy of Armenia, the share of SMEs in Armenia's GDP is about 27%. The adepartment plans to bring this figure up to 50% within the next 5 years.
