The Malta Independent on Sunday
SME’s accessing European funds
It is no cliché that small and medium size enterprises are the backbone of our economy and society as they make products available, render the necessary services and support employment
Being the backbone they tend to be directly affected and respond early to the slightest of alterations. European development funds have sustained local businesses and supported their growth. The Business Enhance Grant Scheme made available €32m to sustain the vision of local entrepreuneurs, help them develop their product and harbour talent.
In spite of the challenges brought about by restrictions and business shutdowns, pandemic induced restrictions should not and will not mean doomsday. A digital shift was on the cards and it was time to walk the talk we had made for quite a while. Enterprises’ commitment to make products available to clients, despite physical inacessibility, accelerated the need for digitisation. The e-commerce scheme has been instrumental to numerous local businesses to set up a digital side to their operation, in turn making their product available internationally and accessible to a significantly wider market.
Beneficiaries saw the scheme covering from the simplest of hosting fees, to the development of a website or a mobile app, up to more complex integrated system designs and management. Even prior to the pandemic, local entrepreneurs fully grasped the need to challenge space and demography through excellence. The SME Internationalisation Scheme has for years, in the preCovid normality, provided the platform for Maltese small enterprises to showcase their products in fairs across the globe.
Innovation is, according to the great economist Joseph Schumpeter, at the centre of all the phenomena, difficulties and problems of economic life. I strongly believe in a binary nature of any industry: innovate or perish. Growth heavily depends on the readiness to water ideas, indulge in research and test new concepts. While steps have been made in recent years, our policy is geared towards multiplying our potential in the field of innovation. The R&D&I scheme is an important pillar for owners willing to defy size and limitations, and ready to take initiatives of research and innovation fitting the National Strategy laid out last year. In supporting the acquisition of knowledge and covering the costs of equipment, personnel and overheads, the scheme guarantees a
“Innovation is, according to the great economist Joseph Schumpeter, at the centre of all the phenomena, difficulties and problems of economic life. I strongly believe in a binary nature of any industry: innovate or perish.”
solid basis for entrepreneurs who realised that innovation is not merely key to grow but necessary to survive.
Together with innovation, diversification is the method and the strategy often adopted by local enterprises to thrive in an increasingly competitive market and to attempt at reaching newer pastures. The SME Diversification and Innovation Grant supports investment in both tangible and intangible assets to sustain strategies which bring about a fundamental change in the overall production of an enterprise, enable an organisation to deliver completely new products or services or else implement improvements to those that it already delivers.
While the Start-up Investment Grant helps newly formed enterprises tangibly and intangibly upon providing a reliable business plan, to make up for those daunting initial hurdles, established business organisations are not only encouraged but supported to grow their undertaking and increase their workforce through the SME Growth Scheme.
These non-repayable grants were determining in the leap from average to excellent in the past years. These schemes are only part of the whole spectrum of funding opportunities that private businesses can tap into. Development funds remain a key pillar to lean on as the Maltese industry grapples encouragingly with the present situation and adapts. They are complemented by a pool of over €15m available in loans meant to support enterprises to upgrade their activities to obtain superior efficiency.
It is estimated that these schemes directly contributed to the creation of 2,000 new jobs in Malta and Gozo. That means 2,000 new opportunities and access to social mobility which builds on the strong economic growth and progress in our general standard of living.
All such schemes, supporting local businesses in their challenges and efforts, are available until the end of June. Any enterprise can apply for support under the range of schemes by the end of each month. The schemes are intended to support and facilitate growth and efficiency. The process involved is sufficiently smooth to relfect such intentions.
European funds have been a cornerstone in the success and growth of our small business ecosystem. In making sure present support is fully exhausted, work is underway to ensure stronger and better schemes are in place in the new financing period.
Stefan Zrinzo Azzopardi is Parliamentary Secretary for European Funds at the Office of the Prime Minister