The Federal Government of Nigeria has been called upon to ease the difficulties encountered by entrepreneurs in accessing bank loans.
Beneficiaries of the state government’s Skills Training and Entrepreneurship Programme (STEP) and the Youth Agricultural and Entrepreneurs Programme (YAGEP) made the call at the 25th Edition of MSMEs Clinic when the Vice President, Prof. Yemi Osibanjo, took a tour of their exhibition stands at the event.
The MSME Clinic hosted on the 6th and 7th of November,2019 by the Delta state Government in collaboration with the Office of the Vice President in Asaba attracted 13 federal government agencies who promote the growth of MSMEs in the country.
Speaking differently on behalf of other beneficiaries, Precious Nwaise, a Fashion Designer, Mercy Oma Esienakerien in Catering and Frank Enonuya in Leather Works and Shoe Making under the STEP programme spoke on their challenges as entrepreneurs.
Precious Nwaise said she had made significant progress in her business from the point of start-up to an enviable height, having trained over 100 persons and 10 persons for free. She said that was her way of giving back to society after 3 years of establishment by the state government.
She said her biggest challenge was how to access loans from the Bank of Industry to procure equipment that would design diverse patterns and prints on fabrics, appealing to the Vice President to use his good office to intervene to enable young entrepreneurs without collateral in terms of property to access loans easily.
Also speaking, Frank Enonuya said his shoes though produced manually are of very high quality and have found their way to Italy. He added that it was his vision to acquire an equipment that would enable him to produce more pairs of shoes per day. He lamented that he lacked the capital to do so and that he had made several attempts to access bank loans without success.
In the same vein, Mercy Oma Esienakerien, commended the federal and state governments’ collaboration in hosting the 25th MSME Clinic in Delta Sate, adding that it has afforded them the opportunity to meet with various relevant federal government agencies that could help her business grow.
Earlier, the Vice President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria and the Delta State Governor, Senator Ifeanyi Okowa, emphasized that Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) are the fastest means of growing the economy of any nation.
They collaborated each other that the federal and state government would find a way to partner with each other to reduce some of the challenges encountered by entrepreneurs to ease the process of doing business in Nigeria.
Speaking at the Plenary Session on the 6th, the Chief Job and Wealth Creation Officer of the state, Prof. Eric Eboh, tasked the representatives of the various federal agencies to address the challenges of accessing loans from their institutions by offering satisfactory solutions to the genuine financial needs of the teeming entrepreneurs gathered to seek answers to the so many questions of how to access loans to finance their businesses without difficulty.
Onyekachukwu-Uteh, Gertrude
Communication Officer