Greater public-private partnerships vital to nurture entrepreneurship

KUALA LUMPUR: The Ministry of Entrepreneur Development has called for greater public-private partnerships to realise the objectives outlined in the National Entrepreneurship Framework (NEF).

Its secretary-general, Datuk Wan Suraya Wan Mohd Radzi said such partnerships were an important element in nurturing the entrepreneurial spirit among Malaysian businesses as set out in the strategic objectives of the NEF.

She said one of the NEF’s targets is to raise the contribution of smallmedium enterprises (SMEs) to the country’s gross domestic product (GDP) to 41 per cent by 2020 from 37 per cent at present.

“In addition, we want to create one million jobs within five years, with 50,000 entrepreneurs creating 200,000 jobs annually,” she said.

Wan Suraya said the ministry also aims to train 50,000 graduates yearly in the entrepreneurial sector, ensure RM50 billion turnover by co-operatives and increase SME contribution to exports from 17 per cent to 23 per cent by 2020.

Meanwhile, she congratulated Commerce.Asia on its recent acquisition of PanPages Lab Sdn Bhd (‘Panpages Lab’), which owns the largest database of SMEs in Southeast Asia.

The latter’s database contains insights into seven million SMEs in seven countries, namely Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam, Indonesia, the Philippines and Cambodia with information being constantly sought after by global search engines and map providers.

The acquisition of Panpages Lab allows Commerce.Asia to expand the reach of its enablers to the entire region by mining extensive database and using the data to provide lead generation to the company’s current and future SME facing Enablers. — Bernama