BUDGET BRINGS OPPORTUNITIES TO SMES

MBABANE – The National Budget delivered by the Minister of Finance, Neal Rijkenberg, seeks to fix the business environment, policies and provide opportunities for entrepreneurs.

This was a view by the Federation of Swazi Business Community (FESBC) Deputy President, Hezekial Mabuza. He said the budget had highlighted a number of opportunities to be explored by the small and medium enterprises (SMEs) such as renovations and construction. Given these opportunities that were outlined by Rijkenberg, Mabuza pleaded with government that the opportunities should be availed firstly to SMEs over international organisations. “Parliament has to pass legislations and policies that will curb the outflow of revenue from the country so that it circulates at least 18 times for the country to generate revenue through tax collection and benefit local players,” he said. Mabuza also noted that the Finance minister also outlined intentions to improve the economy and support SMEs. He said what was missing was the threshold which would curtail in tax reduction for entrepreneurs.

Benefitting

The tax threshold at the moment, according to Mabuza, was benefitting those bringing foreign direct investment (FDI). For example, he said, if an SME makes E50 000 profits per month, it should be tax-free so that the entrepreneur could re-invest that gain and improve their well-being and the economy. “Currently, the benefit is higher for the FDI and local SMEs are financing the gap.” Mabuza said his organisation was seeking that government also devise policies that would assist SMEs access finance. He said at the moment, some SMEs were being accessible to opportunities but were failing to explore them as there was minimal or no funding at all.

He said the access to finance would improve the business sector’s prospects of exporting their produce. Mabuza said the export markets were critical for the country as they would contribute immensely to the Sothern African Customs Union (SACU) receipts apportioned to the country. "If we export our goods in the SACU region, the foreign currency and the tax contributions come into the country. The tax contributions are receipted in SACU and therefore, the country benefits.”

He further implored entrepreneurs to source their raw materials in the SACU region to better the revenue allocated to the country. For this to be possible, Mabuza said, government had to realign policies and laws to favour such business prospects. Mabuza said the Empowerment Bill should explicitly state that any business engagement by government parastatals or ministries should at least have 25 per cent of its services and goods procured from local entrepreneurs.

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