MEP Tonino Picula said that small and medium-sized enterprises are the largest generators of growth and employment in the Union.
He said that cohesion policy represents an extremely important source of financing for these enterprises in times of financial crisis and budget cuts. Micro-enterprises, small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) make up to 99 percent of all enterprises in the EU. They provide two of the three jobs in the private sector and are responsible for more than half of the overall added value achieved by the company in the EU. Nine out of ten SMEs are actually micro-enterprises with less than ten employees.
Picula said that these companies need capital to do more accessible and cheaper to make it easier to reach your potential.
"Access to finance is still the second biggest problem that small and medium-sized enterprises are facing individually. The availability of capital and borrowing terms are an even bigger problem for small and medium-sized enterprises with headquarters outside the euro-zone", Picula said.
It is extremely important that the REGI Committee stress the inequality in the availability of capital and financing sources for example on the European Islands, in mountainous and remote areas. Besides the problems with the funding, the complex procedures and disproportionately high administrative costs make the business more difficult. Also, it is worth pointing that a relatively small number of these enterprises is involved in cross-border business within the EU.
He stressed there are numerous differences among small and medium-sized enterprises and there is a lot of problems that make it difficult for them to achieve full potential.
"Because of that, we have to provide that our policies and measures are customized for them and increase attractiveness of Europe for establishment of companies and the business itself", Picula concluded as the shadow rapporteur of S&D.
You can see the whole speech in the video.
