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Government has put a searchlight on the private sector. We have to take advantage of the various initiative aimed at promoting the private sector and show what we can do. “Nana Afari said.

He was speaking at the launch of the second phase of the business development services fund in Accra.

Available data on the manufacturing industry show that 96 percent of companies in the sector employ 725,000 workers. About 460,000 are engaged in the SME sector, and with a growth rate of 10 percent it is estimated to generate 45,000 new jobs annually.

Numerous challenges have hindered competiveness of the sector, including difficulties in accessing land, new technologies, information, adequate and affordable capital, as well as constraint of competition from imported phase of the business development services fund (BDS) Is to provide support to MSME in the country.US$2.8 million is available for the second phase, with us$ 1.5 million and US$ 1.3 million earmarked for the MSME and renewable energy respectively. It focuses on building the capacity of local business member organization to undertake research and grant application processing.

“If we change our attitude and approach to business and take advantage of this programme, we will benefit greatly from it,” Nana Afari said.

He urged the fund managers to spread fund activities to the regions and district to support local businesses there.

The BDS fund is a matching grant scheme set up under the ministry of trade and industries and the ministry of energy to support the development of market place for business development services for MsMEs in the country.

It is one of the components of the MSME project established in 2007 with the support of the World Bank to provide finance and technical assistance to MSMEs.

The second phase of the BDS fund ends in October 2012.