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{
    "id": 1192576,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1192576/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 310,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Mbeere South, Independent",
    "speaker_title": "Hon. (Eng.) Nebart Muriuki",
    "speaker": null,
    "content": "Hon. Temporary Speaker, while contributing to this Motion on a unified policy, I wish to add that we need to consider how to encourage starting of small businesses and their survival before we go into mentoring, funding and the rest. I want to address what people, especially those who retire, go through. Most people who retire attempt to go into small business to keep themselves busy and also to continue earning a living. A few things which I find people going into small business do not address or do not know how to address is what kind of business they want to go into, where they are going to do it, why they are going to do it, and how to do it. To address those questions calls for training of those who are trying to go into small business. Due to lack of basic training, you find that most people start small businesses which close before the end of one year. One reason is that they go into the wrong business. If people are asked why they are going into business, most of them will say they see other people doing it without addressing the question of availability of market for what they are trying to get into. The Government should take a deliberate effort to make sure that those who are going into small businesses are enlightened on how to do it. The other issue when one is starting a small business, is the kind of hurdles one has to jump before they start the business like the number of licenses. I support this Motion of unifying the policy. You find that one arm of Government does not bother to know what the other arm of Government is doing while trying to encourage the starting and growth of small business. The councils levy all kinds of licenses – Public Health officials, Kenya Bureau of Standards and many others ask for licenses. They are many licenses which a small business has to have. The other point is competition. Once a small business starts, it has to compete with large businesses and the Government appears not to be encouraging small businesses to compete effectively with large ones. When you come to tendering procedures, you find a small business being asked to submit three years of audited accounts. I wonder how many small businesses have audited accounts to submit Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA) certificate. Those who are in small business know one of the institutions which kill small businesses is the KRA. When KRA comes to charge small businesses tax, they charge on turnover. These small businesses rarely break even. You are taxing somebody who has actually made a loss, and when you do this twice, that business will close down. I have been listening to various speakers here. They are avoiding to mention that those who are coming to enforce the various licenses come to extract money from the small businesses, especially the public health officers in hospitality industry. The public health person will keep on coming around and they will only come to extract money in the name of the premises being unfit to run such businesses. These are some of the serious hurdles which the Government must address if the small businesses have to survive and grow. The electronic version of the Official Hansard Report is for information purposesonly. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor."
}