The best performing small and medium sized businesses were feted this week at the inaugural Bizna Annual SME Awards 2019.
The Bizna Annual SME Awards 2019 seeks to recognise and celebrate small and medium-sized enterprises based on their performance, profitability, quality of products and customer relations. The Awards is an initiative of Bizna Kenya, a leading marketing and business support provider for small businesses in Kenya.
Among the winners of the were Expeditions Maasai Safaris, a tours and travel company which won the SME of The Year Award while the runners up position went to Twinkle Pharmacy Limited. The two companies also won in the tourism and hospitality and professional services categories, respectively. SasaHost, a web design and hosting company, won the Most Promising SME Award while Modest Collections won in the transport and logistics category.
Other winners included, Soko Brand (Creatives Economy), Nyagah Engineering Ltd (Manufacturing), Username Investments (Real Estate) and IRRI-Hub (Agribusiness).
President-elect of the Kenya National Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KNCCI) Mr. Patrick Ngatia, who was the chief guest at the ceremony, called for review of various laws especially those that limit SMEs access to credit to boost development of the sector. He regretted that several small businesses are being denied credit facilities due to negative listing by Credit Reference Bureaus (CRB) hence affecting their operations.
Mr.Ngatia added that, “We will be holding discussions with CRBs and relevant government institutions to find a way through which we can save SMEs from negative listing and unlock credit facilities for them. We cannot transform the sector when access to credit is still a major challenge.”
Bizna Kenya CEO Mr. Tonnie Mello, had this to say, “There is need for capacity building for small business to make them successful. These businesses are run by hardworking entrepreneurs but they require more knowledge on business management.”