Effects of non-financial promotional programs on the performance of Micro and Small enterprises (MSEs). A case study of MSEs in Eldoret Municipality

Abstract

Economic growth in many countries had been pegged on the performance of large firms. These are firms endowed with enormous financial and non-financial resources. Micro and Small Enterprises (MSE} have been totally ignored with regard to this expansion. Through the 1960s, little effort had been done to fund MSE sector in a bid to empower the small-scale vendors contribute to the economy. From the 70s onwards, funding has been consistently increasing for this segment but output has not been reflected proportionately.

It is with this statistics that the researcher intends to demystify the belief that funding is the major impediment in the sector. The researcher hypothesizes Non-Financial Promotional Programs as the key impediments. That MSE sector operators lack the requisite knowledge, on marketing, training, and credit sourcing due to inadequate educational standards is apparent. The researcher intends to find out whether the absence of these programmes has a direct bearing to the massive failure rate and subsequent stunted growth in the sector. The research methodology will be descriptive survey, where the researcher with the aid of a research assistants administer questionnaires by using drop and pick method and at length helping illiterate respondents. The questions are both open and closed ended in nature in order to deduce maximum relevant data.

The sample frame will be drawn from the sample population of Small Business Holders within Eldoret Municipality. Systematic Sampling, Stratified Sampling and Purposive Sampling techniques will be integrated during the process. Primary data captured from the field will be analyzed by use of Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) and results returned through descriptive statistics tools such as frequency tables and percentages, multiple regression and cross tabulation. Recommendations and conclusions thereto will be drawn based on the findings so as to relate with the initial hypotheses.