It is not so much last Saturday’s signing of a ‘Declaration to foster social and economic development’ between the Georgetown Chamber of Commerce and Industry (GCCI) and the United Nations, as it is the actualization of the tenets of the Declaration that will help to provide a real assessment of the extent of the accomplishment of the Chamber-organized Small Business Week.
Small Business Week 2023 was timely. It came at a time when the growth of the small business sector could be contemplated against the backdrop of a public treasury that is in much better shape than it had been in previous years to contribute materially to growth-related initiatives for the sector.
Contextually, government should be reminded that poverty-alleviation is one of its critical missions and that the vehicle of the micro and small business sector is one of the ideal avenues through which this goal can be accomplished. Investing in the establishment of micro and small businesses and assisting in the strengthening of existing ones is as good an option as any with which to pursue poverty alleviation. Unquestionably, the icing on the cake of the Small Business Week programme was the signing of a Declaration between the GCCI and the United Nations through which, we are told, the two will seek to advance the objectives of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development adopted by member-states of the UN in 2015 provides “a shared blueprint for peace and prosperity for people and the planet, now and into the future.” At its heart are what are deemed to be seventeen SDGs to which the international community has a duty to respond with the utmost urgency. Whatever the actual content of the signed Declaration – and here we assume that it speaks to issues pertaining to how the GCCI and the UN can work together for the good of the local small business sector – one expects that sooner rather than later, what has been agreed to between the GCCI and the UN, will be made public since it is altogether reasonable to assume that the contents of the Declaration are connected in one way or another to the advancement of the small business sector in Guyana.
In passing, one might add that elsewhere in its coverage of the Small Business Week programme, the Stabroek Business has expressed the view that while government has an important role to play in making resources available for the growth of the small business sector, history instructs that it is best that critical operating decisions – in matters pertaining to the manner in which the small business sector operates – excuses government from any day-to-day operating responsibilities. Here, we have argued that the behavioural culture of the state sector is different in some fundamental respects from that of the business sector and that the long-entrenched practice of the state ‘calling the shots’ in matters to do with the well-being of the small business sector has not, over time, been crowned with success.
By contrast the signing, between the GCCI and the UN, of a ‘Declaration to foster social and economic development,’ clears the way for the local small business sector to seek and acquire guidance and support at the highest level of international organization. What the signing of the Agreement between the UN and the GCCI has done is to further burnish the image of the Chamber as an institution that plays a critical role in the growth and development of the small business sector. The 2030 Agenda provides what has been termed “a shared blueprint for peace and prosperity for people and the planet now and into the future.” In the fullness of time, one expects, the GCCI will publish an enlightening report, sections of which, one assumes, will instruct us on the accomplishments of the Small Business Week.
One expects too that such a report will inform the various audiences on the accomplishments of the week of activities, the state of health of the Small Business Sector and the plans that are in store for the growth and development of the sector, particularly in terms of the incremental economic empowerment of Guyanese involved in one or another small business pursuit.
