SMEs: THEIR PROGRESS IN THE ALBANIAN ECONOMY
SMEs: THEIR PROGRESS IN THE ALBANIAN ECONOMY

Summary/Abstract: Small and Medium Enterprise (SME) financing is a topic of significant research interest to academics, and an issue of great importance to the policy makers around the world. Economic, as well as technical and social arguments warrant the promotion of SMEs. They create large scale, low-cost employment opportunities, use locally available inputs and technologies, mobilize small and scattered private savings, develop entrepreneurship, and correct the regional imbalance in development that exists in industrialized countries. Despite all these potentials SMEs are disappearing, abandoning the essential role they could have played in economic development. Several studies identify financing, infrastructure facilities, taxes, regulations and stability in policies as major obstacles for the growth of small and medium businesses. In the last ten years, governments in the transition countries have introduced a number of policies aiming to promote entrepreneurship through SME development. The main impetus for this intervention is the specific constraints encountered by private enterprises. Academics argue that the SME sector can be much more responsive and flexible to changes in the market place and much less capable to influence such developments.

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