IT TOOK Government nearly six months to deliver on a promise to stimulate small businesses through a special procurement window and even after its implementation, the association representing these entities is not happy.

"Despite the presence of water in the tank, Rome is burning," Edward Chin-Mook, president of the Small Business Association of Jamaica (SBAJ), tells The Sunday Gleaner.

Prime Minister Bruce Golding announced in December, as part of the Government's stimulus initiative, that a system would come on stream that would allow small and micro businesses to benefit from 15 per cent of all contracts being paid for by taxpayer's dollars.

A June 2 circular from the Ministry of Finance announced Cabinet's approval of one aspect of Golding's stimulus programme.

"All entities shall make their best endeavours each fiscal year to spend a minimum of 15 per cent of budget procurement expenditure with MSEs," (micro and small enterprises), the correspondence read.

The circular also said that all government entities doing procurement should post notices of all procurements intended for the MSE on a designated Ministry of Industry, Investment and Commerce webpage.

crisis

However, the webpage, www.miic.gov.jm/msesetaside.htm, up to press time, was blank, save for its lone content which read: "to be updated".

Meanwhile, Chin-Mook charges that Government has failed to demonstrate that it is committed to saving the small business sector, especially during this time of crisis.

"The small business association is lobbying for a unified ERP accounting system where 15 per cent of all purchases, large and small, must come to small businesses through an appropriate mechanism, enabling opportunities and stimulating new innovative enterprises," Chin-Mook reasons.

Under the stimulus initiative, small and micro enterprises must be registered with the Companies Office of Jamaica, be tax-compliant and have assets not exceeding $30 million to benefit.

Cabinet approved a maximum of $1 million per contract for the procurement of goods. It set the maximum value for general services at $5 million and $10 million for works.

However, Chin-Mook says that the announcement has not brought the level of success that was anticipated.

"This procurement policy is being looked at as a normal, run-of-the-mill intervention. It should actually be something which is specific and you put some specific attention to it," Chin-Mook says.

He adds: "The Ministry of Industry, Investment and Commerce along with the Ministry of Finance must combine their efforts to roll out a working model to operationalise same or it will just be another grand announcement."

But, Reginald Budhan, the permanent secretary in the Ministry of Industry, Investment and Commerce tells The Sunday Gleaner that not only is the policy in place, but it carries less red tape than a process that was proposed by the SBAJ.

He says Chin-Mook is complaining because he wants all small businesses to go through his organisation to benefit from the intervention.

bottleneck

"Anybody who is going to supply goods to Government under this framework, the small businesses (association) wants them to come through them ... they would probably get a margin off the contracts ... we don't want that. We don't want to create a bottleneck in the system," Budhan says.

Budhan has promised that the ministry will exercise robust management of the procurement system.

"We are going to put in place an information system to see how much agencies of government procure and to monitor and kind of beat them over the head and say you need to make your target. The aim is to force more of the business down the line to the small people," Budhan says.

-D.L.

daraine.luton@gleanerjm.com