SME Policy, Legislations and Regulations
Leading the government of Lebanon’s drive to transform the environment for business
Objective
This component aims at creating an enabling environment by focusing on changing laws and regulations, proposing SME development strategies (based and benchmarked against the framework of the SME charter and the Bologna charter) and offering sources of information that can be used by SMEs to expand potential.
Contents
Assist the MoET in creating an enabling environment by:
• Identifying legal and procedural impediments and working on changing them
• Drafting an SME strategy that integrates legal, financial, business support, and economic issues to facilitate the creation of a better SME environment
This component has two main outputs, contributing to the creation of an enabling environment for SMEs, and the development of an SME Support Unit that will be a hub of information and initiatives. The Unit will also play a coordinating role with international and national donors trying to rationalize SME funding in Lebanon.
The main aims of the component are to:
- Review and improve market and business environment for SMEs and start-ups.
- Carry out a legal review based on the life cycle of enterprises in order to highlight obstacles and to propose legislation and regulatory reforms.
- Design a comprehensive SME strategy.
- Create coordination between public and private sector stakeholders, and examine the potential of a Competitiveness Council for Lebanon, along the Irish model.
- Develop Donor Coordination capability within SME Support Unit.
The SME Support Unit welcomes the contributions of the business community and anyone wishing to comment or contribute should in the first instance contact: sme-info@economy.gov.lb
What we plan to do
Cluster 2 OWP
Cluster 2 AWP
Progress to Date
• Information gathering exercises have been completed:
▫ Legal Review- An extensive review of Lebanese legislation pertaining to SMEs has been finalised, and has identified procedural and legal bottlenecks in the system
▫ Business and Market Review- A survey of 300 SMEs has been carried out and has provided enterprise level input on identified problem areas
The results of the two surveys are to be disseminated to various stakeholders/beneficiaries and consensus sought on priorities for change in policy, regulation and legislation which will be taken forward by the Programme
• Steering and Advisory committees have been formed and are operational. These committees are made up of representatives from the private and the public sectors and are tasked with providing strategic guidance and institutional advice
(coming soon)
Announcement
Reports
Events