Small and medium - sized enterprises needed to identify their problems to raise solutions for sustainable development. – Photo nhadautu.vn

The forum was held by the Centre for Support of SMEs in the North (TAC) under the Ministry of Planning and Investment’s Department of Enterprise Development and Bizen Viet Nam Joint Stock Company.

Le Van Khuong, TAC’s Director, said that in today’s volatile business environment, SMEs encountered various difficulties because of their modest scales.

“Each SME has their own problems and difficulties,” Khuong said, adding that identifying SMEs’ weakness would be important to create solutions for them towards sustainable development.

Khuong said focus should be placed on providing training to SMEs to enhance their capacity and optimise resources.

Quang Minh, chairman of Bizen Viet Nam, said the forum was a part of BKTalk – a platform where SMEs could discuss with experts to identify their difficulties and find measures for development. BKTalk also provides training and consultancy about corporate governance for SMEs.

Experts at the forum said SMEs encountered with problems related to accessing banking credit, tax reporting, transparency in accounting, human resource management and building brands.

According to the Ministry of Finance’s statistics, Viet Nam has more than 600,000 firms, nearly 500,000 of them private firms with 96 per cent of being small and micro scales.

SMEs play a significant role in the country’s socio-economic development, creating 1.2 million jobs and contributing more than 40 per cent of gross domestic product.

Recently, the ministry proposed cutting corporate income tax rates on small and micro businesses from the current 20 per cent to 15-17 per cent. This aims to promote the development of SMEs so Viet Nam could have one million firms by 2020, a Government target. — VNS