Plot 54352, West Avenue,
Zambezi Towers, Tower A,
7th Floor, South Wing,
Private Bag 0034
Gaborone, Botswana
Tel: (267) 3191146
Fax: (267) 3191147
Email: info@sadc-dfrc.org
The adoption by SADC central banks of comprehensive supervision systems for the financial sector and the resultant changes to legislation and regulations has brought about major challenges to the operations of non-banking FIs, especially in the area of capital adequacy requirements.
The research will assess the nature of capital requirements; evaluate the enabling supervisory legislation and regulations; evaluate their impact on non-banking FIs; and explore opportunities for regional harmonisation in the legislation and application of capital adequacy standards
The research objective is to recommend the adoption of best practices by SADC governments with regard to establishment of a supportive business environment for SMEs. Thus, it will among other things, evaluate existing policies, regulations and effectiveness of institutions set up for SMEs; evaluate and recommend the role of DFIs; assess the impact of internal institutional factors; investigate the effectiveness of existing incentive structures; and analyse sectoral distribution of SME.
This research project recognizes the importance of procurement policies in stimulating SME growth and will, analyse current procurement policies and their efficacy; assess impact of the policies and the sectoral spread of SMEs; and investigate regulatory and institutional arrangements, including the role of DFIs.
The objective is to recommend best practice policies for SADC with the benefit of relevant experiences in other regions.
The terms of reference for this project will include: examine extent and nature of linkages for SMEs in region; scan and evaluate global environment for relevant experiences; assess impact of policy, regulatory and institutional factors; evaluate existing incentive structures to support linkages; analyse beneficiary sectors and the impact of mentoring; and review relevant case studies, including the Mozambican Aluminum project (Mozal 1 and 2) in the Maputo Development Corridor, and the extent to which they could serve as models for adoption by other SADC countries.
As SADC economies open up in response to globalization, export competitiveness becomes increasingly crucial. SMEs have been observed to play a major role in export strategies on developing countries.
To enhance benefits to SADC countries from SME exports, the terms of reference for this project include the following: assess the impact of trade liberalisation on SMEs; evaluate existing regulations, policies and incentive structures; analyse the spread of SMEs in export sectors; examine institutional factors that support/constrain SME exports; and taking into account experiences in other regions recommend an export model for SADC SMEs.