A survey of factors affecting the growth of micro and small enterprises in Kenya
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Date
2011-08-24
Authors
Owino, Eliud Waguwa
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Abstract
There is no doubt that entrepreneurship has been widely accepted as an engine of economic growth and innovation. In particular, developing countries are seeking ways in which they can increase entrepreneurial activity via small business development in order to tackle poverty and unemployment problems that have plagued these nations for a long time. Kenya is no exception to this fact. The researcher is of the view that entrepreneurship is Central to the success of the MSE's. The purpose of this study was to bridge the research gap by examining the factors that affect the growth of MSE's in Kenya. The study was of survey type and adopted an exploratory design to obtain primary data. The target population of the study was all the traders at Uhuru Market The sample for the study was drawn by 'stratified random sampling with proportionate allocation and consisted of a total of 100 respondents who were the entrepreneurs or owners of the small enterprises. The population frame was a list of 1,000 traders from Nairobi City Council. Data was analyzed using descriptive statistics and with the help of the SPSS computer package, the data was presented in tables, bar graphs and pie-charts. The study found a moderate overall proportion of women 58% in micro and small enterprises which covered areas like tailoring and embroidery, saloons and restaurants. All small business owners had realized growth in business as a result of hard work. A moderate number of small business owners 44% had been in the business for the period between one and five years. Most small business owners were of secondary and tertiary levels of education. Quite a number of the entrepreneurs were certain that Technology, Marketing strategies, Capital/credit, Accounting records and Legislation/Policies were crucial for growth. The study concluded that small business owners sustain the business growth by accessing technology, marketing strategies, capita/credit, accounting records and legislation/policies. The study underscores the need to make frequent changes in marketing skills in order to enhance the business growth. Technological innovations need to be adopted to facilitate the production of better quality products which can compete locally and internationally. Deregulation policies should be implemented to enable financial institutions charge affordable and competitive interest rates. Entrepreneurs need to attend capacity building courses in time management to enable them reduce stress in the preparation of accounting records. Local government laws and other regulations should be reviewed to enable small business owners realize profit and growth in business. The study suggests that further research should be done to establish factors leading to lack of technological drive among small business owners and also to find out why some of them fail to strategize in their marketing programmes for profit and growth. Harmonization of the operations of financial institutions also requires further research to enable them charge affordable interest rates to small business owners. Further research is also necessary to find out the demotivating factors blocking small business owners from preparing accounting records necessary for controlling the business. The numerous government proposals which favour small scale enterprises are never implemented and therefore further research needs to be done to find out why this happens.
Description
The HD 2346.K4O95
Keywords
Small business--Kenya--Nairobi//Informal Sector(economics)--Kenya--Nairobi