Wema Bank Plc, one of the old generation banks in the country, has advised Small and Medium Enterprises’ (MSMEs) owners and managers in the country on the need for them to upscale their skills and operational strategies, including those relating to financial management, to grow their businesses.
The call was made during the Business Growth and Innovation Conference organized by the lender in collaboration with the Enugu State Government for SMEs in Enugu, the state capital.
Addressing participants at the 2-day event which featured over 250 SME owners, Wema Bank’s Head of SME Banking, Arthur Nkemeh, pointed out that the lender’s interventions, which comprised SME Advisory & Non-Financial Services, Business Accounts Products, and Loan Products, were part of its commitment to boosting SME sub-sector’s growth and profitability on a sustainable basis.
The banker explained: “Our loan products include the Business Support Facility, which is designed to help businesses finance stock and other business needs; School Support Facility that supports schools to meet recurrent expenditure; Pharma Loan, targeted at supporting pharmacy store owners with working capital; and the Green Energy Finance Facility that provides affordable financing for SMEs that want to acquire clean energy solutions like solar panels, inverters and batteries.
“Others are the Medi Loan, designed to meet working capital needs of private hospitals, clinics and diagnostic laboratories; and the DBN Loan, a partnership with the Development Bank of Nigeria (DBN) that provides funding to SMEs at very affordable rate and engenders inclusive growth.
“All these facilities offer SMEs various amounts ranging from N100,000 to up to N720 million and have tenures ranging from one month to six years. Therefore, I call on the owners and managers of SMEs to take advantage of these products”, Nkemeh added.
The topics covered during the two-day capacity building forum, which featured experts in finance and business analysts covered a broad spectrum of strategy and innovations to digital transformation, sales and marketing and financial management.
