After the 220 billion, there is the new 31.52 billion Naira for Micro, Small and Medium Enterprise: Where did, and will the money go!

Adamu and Chukwuma have been a long term friend at the Abuja Park in Gusau, Zamfara, and each time I want to buy a recharge card from their kiosk, they ask if I know how their businesses can be funded by the government, and if also they could learn how to write business proposals, if eventually the funds are made available. My response many times has been that they should check the Nigeria SME toolkit, and that also they can visit the Zamfara Medium and Small Enterprise Agency, or the Zakat Board of the state, and ask if they could learn writing proposals with their agency.

While not sure if there is one, it is certain that the state receives and must have received some SME funds from the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN). Yes! for some years now, funds meant for such programmes and intervention are being domiciled with the CBN, but unfortunately, it seem people like Adamu and Chukwuma will never have access to such funds or programmes, if the apex bank cannot justify or present impacts of “heavy funds” that have been allocated to micro, small and medium enterprise.

Nigeria, with an unemployment rate of 9.9% in Q3 2015 has a better unemployment rate than reported in 67 countries but worse than 113 countries, including 21 African countries with unemployment rates lower than 9.9% needs to employ innovative means of engaging MSMEs other than this “screaming headlines” kind of funding. The state governments are not even helping matters, as some of them had turn this funds into political campaign funds. Hold on – there is a new funding again for MSMEs called BIG (Business, Innovation and Growth), this time, it claims to be innovative, much more than the YOUWIN intervention

To so many Nigerians, it is not clear where they can access this funds, and when it becomes clear as well, the proper strategy is not used in mentoring young enterprises, and many times, potential enterprise are frustrated to start applying for jobs. Truth be told, the funds are out there for MSMES, and we really need to let potential entrepreneurs know, consequently, we are planning to visualise MSME Funds in Nigeria, and make people like Adamu and Chukwuma know where and how to get one.
If you have had access to an SME funds in Nigeria recently, what do you think about this controversies, and if you have gone through what Adamu and Chukwuma had experienced in the past trying to access MSME Funds, do let us know your thoughts

Join the Open Data Day Hackathon

Saturday 5th March at 9 am Abuja / 8 am London

We hope that a diverse group of you will join in the gathering of SME Funds data. During the Hackathon you will have plenty of chances to discuss all questions regarding MSME funds failures whether they be specific cases. Do not let your state or region leave a blank spot when we draw up the map of MSME Funds.

At the data party we will go through some of these questions:

• What kind of MSME funds do we wish to collect (date, amount, description of intervention, location etc.)?
• What are the possible sources (press, CBN, Bilateral Agencies, Multilateral Agencies)?
• Getting started with the data collection for the MSME Funds Tracker

 You can join the Data party by adding your name and skype ID here.