The number of micro, small and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs) in Nigeria has rose by 12.3 percent over four years, a recent report by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) and Small and Medium Enterprises Development Agency of Nigeria (SMEDAN) has said.
The number of MSMEs grew from 37million in 2013 to 41.5million in 2017, the 2017 National Survey shows.
According to the report, micro enterprises account for 99.8percent of the total businesses, while small and medium size enterprises both account for less than 1percent each.
“Compared with 2013, both total MSMEs and micro enterprises grew by 12.1 percent while small enterprises, grew 4.6percent from 2013,” the report states.
“The number of medium-sized enterprises decreased significantly from 4,670 in 2013 to 1,793 in 2017, indicating a 61 percent drop,” the report adds.
Lagos, Oyo and Osun account for the highest gaining states for the growth in the number of MSMEs, while Kano, Rivers, Plateau recorded the biggest decline.
The report stated that wholesale/retail trade, agriculture and other services activities make up 76.3percent of micro businesses.
Education, human health and social works were identified as sectors that require high numbers of employers or skilled labour with very low numbers of micro businesses.
Accommodation & Food services is a preferred sector (top 5) across all business classification types, the report states.
“MSMEs generated 59,647,954 jobs as of December 2017, five percent or 2,889,715 of those jobs were created by SMEs with males accounting for 57 percent compared with 43 percent for females,” the report says
