By Alpha Abu
Sierra Leone’s Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) are to benefit from a $ 40 million grant from the World Bank as support towards investment and growth. The grant is expected to contribute to the country’s Economic Diversification Project by strengthening businesses, enhancing reforms and competitiveness, and building the capacity of private sector operators and public institutions.
It specifically targets non-productive mining sectors.
Limited access to finance, weak capacity to scale up businesses, little access to information and poor infrastructure were some of the challenges the Bank says SMEs face in the country, and it identifies women entrepreneurs as those disproportionately impacted, as a result.
World Bank Country Manager for Sierra Leone, Gayle Martin, says: “promoting economic diversification to reallocate resources from low to high productivity sectors can boost growth in GDP per capita and reduce poverty.”
According to the Bank, the project will be “consistent with the Sierra Leone Government’s Medium Term National Development Plan for the period 2019-2023 and its strategic objective to prioritize private sector-led growth for job creation, poverty reduction and economic diversification.”
Gayle Martin believes that “harnessing of Sierra Leone’s potential to meet the growing demand for jobs and sustainable and equitable growth will largely depend on its ability to diversify the economy.” She further highlights the “critical need to boost the competitiveness of growth sectors such as manufacturing and services to create jobs and generate labor income as a sustainable pathway for inclusive growth.”
On the commencement of the project, the bank believes initial project activities “will directly support the government’s immediate efforts to address the economic impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, in particular its impact on SMEs in hard hit sectors such as tourism.”
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