#UgSMEs Alternatives to Debt Financing for SMEs in Uganda

As someone who runs a small midsize enterprise, and has had a full month off work enjoying nuptial arrangements plus reading everything I could find during the moon in the honey; the Deloitte write-ups about Small Medium Enterprises are insightful and shade a lot of light on the financial challenges faced by these businesses.

According to the Uganda Bureau of Statistics (UBoS), Micro Small and midsize enterprises (MSME) are categorised based on meeting any one of the criteria relating to the number of employees or total assets. The classification of MSMEs assesses all businesses irrespective of the legal form of the enterprise. Microenterprises are businesses that employ less than five people and have total assets not exceeding Ugandan Shillings (UGX)10m. Small enterprises employ between 5-49 people and have total assets between UGX 10m and 100m. Medium enterprises employ between 50-100 people and have total assets between UGX 100m and 360m. MSMEs employ approximately 2.5m people and makeup approximately 90% of private sector employment.

They also contribute 20% of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and produce 80% of Uganda’s manufactured output. Despite the significant contribution to GDP by the MSME component of the private sector, access to finance remains difficult. The World Bank’s enterprise survey carried out in Uganda between January 2013 and July 2014 found that
only 9.7% of MSMEs have a bank loan or line of credit. The survey also revealed that 58% of MSMEs require financing

Read about the challenges and way forward to financing SMEs in Uganda in the PDF below;

Patricia Kahill

Patricia Kahill is a multipotentialite Christian entrepreneur, Content Marketing Coach and founder of the Content Marketing agency, Kahill Insights that helps business owners create engaging and interactive content items for digital platforms with a focus on returning a desired outcome. Patricia was the producer of SlamDunk Basketball Talk a show on House of Talent online TV, a former fellow at Harvest Institute for leadership and now an assessor there, and an alumnus of the YELP class of 2017. A member of the BNI Integrity chapter and African Women Entrepreneur Cooperative. She is driven by passion and curiosity, been taking every opportunity that has been given to her with an ambition of stamping her footprint on the world.