Almost 5 000 SMME jobs boosted with R85 million in funding since 2019

Small, Medium and Micro-Enterprises (SMMEs) are essential to any economy and the driving force behind economic growth and job creation. To enable the growth of these engines of our economy, the Western Cape Government’s (WCG) SMME Booster Fund has assisted over 950 SMMEs, sustaining 4 977 jobs, dedicating R85, 5 million to this essential boosting since 2019.

“The fact is that we need SMMEs to succeed because we know that small businesses are the backbone of our economy and are responsible for up to 70% of jobs in South Africa. As the driving force of job-creation in any economy, one of the WCG’s key priorities is to back entrepreneurs and small businesses, to create an enabling environment and to make it much easier to do business in the Western Cape. This is more than just simply allocating funding. Our SMME Booster Fund assists businesses with bespoke support, helping to remove barriers to the growth of women-, youth-, and township-owned businesses, as well as SMMEs developing exports” said Minister of Finance and Economic Opportunities, Mireille Wenger. 

“Applications for the 2024 SMME Booster fund will open in May 2024 and I look forward to sharing more information on the latest iteration of the fund soon,” continued Minister Wenger.

“I had the pleasure of meeting with one of the many beneficiaries of the SMME Booster fund recently, Mr Imtiyaaz Riley, of Loop Transport (https://www.looptaxi.co.za). Loop Transport is a fantastic example of how the digital, township, informal and formal economies are intricately linked. The business provides commuters and public transport drivers with a platform to interact, facilitate cashless payments, and plan and monitor trips.  After receiving digitisation services, marketing and promotion support through our intermediary organisations, as well as an inverter to keep operating when Eskom turns the power off, Mr Riley has been able to grow his business from 3 employees, to 13 employees, in just three years,” Minister Wenger explained.

“Mr Riley shared how they are on a mission to bring mini-bus taxi operations into the 21st century by harnessing the power of technology to make taxi trips seamless, convenient and safe. Driven by a vision to fundamentally reimagine transport in South Africa, improving the daily commute for more than 4 million riders and more than 400,000 taxi drivers, I am very proud of the support offered and which has enabled this SMME to expand and create more job opportunities for residents of the Western Cape. This one example exemplifies the very purpose of the WCG’s economic action plan, ‘Growth For Jobs’,” continued Minister Wenger.

At the heart of G4J is the understanding that it is the private sector, and particularly, SMMEs, that create jobs and that the role of government is to provide the foundations and fundamentals of economic growth, so that SMMEs and the private sector can get on with growing their businesses and creating both economic growth and jobs.

Ultimately, G4J sets a target of building on and improving the foundations of growth in the Western Cape, so that collectively, we can achieve a trillion-rand jobs-rich, inclusive, sustainable, diverse, and resilient provincial economy, that is growing at between 4 and 6 per cent per year in real terms by 2035.

“We are determined to boost the foundations for economic growth, and to enable the expansion of SMMEs, so that we can achieve breakout economic growth and enable hundreds of thousands of new jobs that we need to lift more and more people out of poverty,” concluded Minister Wenger.