The draft Law on Support to Small and Medium - Sized Enterprises is expected to be passed soon.(Photo: fica.vn) Hanoi (VNA) - Support provided to small and medium-sized enterprises(SMEs) will not be in cash, but rather take the form of favourable conditionsin order for SMEs to grow, Deputy Minister of Planning and Investment Dang Huy Donghas said.
Dong spoke at an online conference held by the Government’s e-portal on June 6,saying that the draft Law on Support to SMEs, which was under discussion by theNational Assembly and is expected to be passed next week, would focus on threeprogrammes so as to realise the Government’s goal of doubling the number offirms to one million by 2020.
Those include support to firms converting from business households; support tostart-ups and the development of the ecosystem; and support to firms involvedin the global value chain.
“Support provided in cash is inefficient and difficult to implement, given theGovernment’s limited budget,” Dong said, adding that SMEs would instead receivesupport in market information, administrative procedures, tax and creditincentives.
According to Nguyen Van Phuc, former Chairman of the National Assembly EconomicCommittee, this law was critical to the development of businesses but theissuance of this law would require changes in many policies, such as ones onland, to create a synchronous and consistent legal system to facilitatebusiness operation.
Phuc said that support should be specific to ensure it is applicable to realityand SMEs would benefit.
To Hoai Nam, General Secretary of the Association of SMEs said that VietnameseSMEs were struggling with land and credit access, technology, human resources,as well as market information.
In the first four months of this year, the number of firms halting operationsrose 9 percent compared to the same period last year to 27,000, which wasalarming.
Whenthe law is passed, drastic measures must be taken to ensure that the law worksin practice and benefits SMEs.
Thereare around 500,000 firms in Vietnam, 97 percent of which are SMEs.-VNA
VNA
