Embrace ICT for Development, Minister Urges SMEs

Thursday, November 10, 2011

Small and Medium Scale Enterprise (SME) operators have been urged to leverage the power of the Internet in transforming their businesses.

Speaking at the Google Business Summit in Lagos, the Minister of Communications Technology, Mrs Omobola Johnson, said research supports the concept of putting businesses online.

“Today, Nigeria has an estimated 33 million Internet users and we have targets to double this number in the next three to four years. Getting your business online immediately gives you access to this market, not to talk of the hundreds of millions of other Internet users out there – a very strong value proposition in our opinion.

“There is also increasing empirical evidence that suggests that simply by putting a Website on the Internet, revenue and productivity of SMEs increase many fold with commensurate contributions to job and wealth creation and of course, GDP,” Mrs Johnson said.

She noted that getting businesses online provides access to markets (retail, wholesale, local and international) at a fraction of the cost of traditional advertising and marketing.

She added that ICT’s, through the Internet, enable local companies to select and partner with companies in the international business community, going beyond the borders of their natural territories to interact, collaborate and do business with their counterparts across the globe.

Source: The Nation (link opens in a new window)