Reacting to the recent disclosure in the Stabroek Business, President of the Guyana Manufacturing and Services Association (GMSA) Ramsay Ali, is to meet with senior government officials to discuss a closer relationship between the manufacturing body and the state-run Small Business Bureau (SBB). Several small-business owners have told this newspaper that they would welcome the GMSA playing a role in helping the SBB to develop an enhanced appreciation of the “culture” of small businesses and to adopt their own modus operandi to better respond to small-business needs.
After it had been disclosed that an understanding had been reached regarding a meeting between Ali and Vice President Bharrat Jagdeo and Senior Minister in the Ministry of Finance, Ashni Singh, the Stabroek Business spoke with seven (7) small-business owners, three of whom had previously spoken with the publication regarding what they referred to as the sloth associated with engaging the SBB on matters pertaining to state support for their business enterprises.
The feedback gleaned from a limited group discussion suggested that these businessmen were all in support of engagement between the SBB and the two members of Cabinet. Asked about what they felt such an engagement should address, they responded, again unanimously, that any engagement between the private sector and the two government officials should address, a priori, what they believe are the delays that are sometimes associated with engaging the SBB to secure help for small-business development-related projects.
At the 2023 mid-year GMSA Dinner, Ali had used his presentation as president of the private sector body to make public his wish for the GMSA to have a ‘sit down’ with the SBB, an engagement which he strongly implied in his presentation, was intended to help the state-run bureau secure a more informed understanding of the ‘ways’ of the private sector and maximise the Bureau’s focus on attaching an enhanced level of expeditiousness in the processing of matters relating to providing support for small-business growth.
While Ali’s address had provided no additional definitive clues regarding the specifics of likely interaction with the SBB, he appeared to imply that the GMSA could play a role in helping the SBB adjust its service delivery culture to render it more responsive to the ‘behavioral culture’ of the small-business sector in pursuit of support for what, sometimes, are fragile small-business enterprises.
One East Coast businessman who was part of the discussion asserted that the SBB was inclined to “behave as if it is a government ministry,” in treating with small-business needs. They don’t understand that the ‘check back…’ behaviour could mean that tomorrow you don’t have a business.
While the GMSA is yet to release information on the likely agenda for the meeting, one of the discussants suggested that, among other things, any such meeting should address “clear time frames” for responding to approaches to the SBB by small-business owners and moving as close as possible to the Bureau “taking on’ a “one stop agency” role.
In his presentation at the dinner, Ali had also asserted that collaboration between the GMSA and the SBB could benefit the private sector and specifically small businesses in other ways. And while he did not say so directly, in his address Ali seemed to suggest that the GMSA could play a role in helping the SBB adjust its service delivery culture to render it more responsive to the priorities of the small- business culture.
Business concerns over what is regarded in some quarters as the sloth and bureaucracy associated with securing financial support from the SBB have been expressed to this newspaper from time to time.
While Ali’s dinner address had provided few clues as the likely precise agenda of the sought after meeting with government, he strongly implied that he believed that the GMSA, as a long-standing private sector body, could perhaps play a hand-holding role in supporting the relationship between the SBB and its clients and potential clients in the small-business sector.
Last week, in random interviews with small-business owners who this newspaper had earlier briefed on the idea ‘floated’ by Mr. Ali at the dinner, and which appeared to have been endorsed by government, this newspaper learnt from the respondents that some form of constructive interaction between the GMSA and the state-run small-business support body, the SBB, can help change what they see as a culture of sloth and bureaucracy. “Taken straight from the Public Service playbook,” as the owner of a thriving retail business put it. “Sometimes you get the impression that they are more concerned with enforcing rules that are not really helpful to small businesses.”
Whether the promised meeting between the GMSA President and Vice President Bharrat Jagdeo and Senior Minister in the Ministry of Finance, Dr. Ashni Singh will see the GMSA playing a role in changing the bureaucratic culture of the SBB is unclear, though feedback from respondents to questions raised by the Stabroek Business suggests that setting aside its duty to play an “accountability role” in instances where state funds are being utilised to support small-business growth, state-controlled small-business support should not have to be ‘hemmed in’ by the dictates of the state when it comes to the actual running of small businesses.
Recently, the issue of state support for entrepreneurial growth in Guyana has become a more prominent debating topic in the small-business community, with small-business owners clamouring for more generous financial support for the small-business sector, citing what, these days, is the significantly increased availability of finances, arising out of the country’s oil fortunes. Some respondents to questions put by this newspaper have even moved to question the rationale behind a Ministry of Business, asserting that its existence suggests that the state continues to be keen to play a central role is fashioning the country’s business culture.
Late in August the Stabroek Business had learnt from the GMSA President that the meeting between himself and the two key Cabinet Ministers that the meeting being sought him was likely to have been held in about two weeks’ time.” The timeline suggests that the engagement should now be imminent.
