Study to Identify Challenges for SMEs Seeking Access to Finance

PMC Research recently launched a new project entitled “Leveraging SME Finance through Value Chains in Georgia”, designed to study the challenges facing SMEs with a particular focus on access to finance in Georgia.

On June 21, Goga Khishtovani, Director at PMC Research, presented the research outline as part of the inception workshop in Beijing. The event, as well as the project, was supported by the Asian Development Bank Institute (ADBI), the Asian Development Bank (ADB) and the CAREC Institute (CI).

The research will be oriented toward analyzing several key aspects, especially the cultural, procedural, institutional and regulatory incentives and disincentives facing SMEs seeking to access finance and the reasons behind such access being blocked or rejected.

The paper will also study the financial knowledge of managers of SMEs in Georgia, and assess the status of domestic and global value chains in Georgia, opportunities for SMEs to link with both domestic and global value chains and the potential impact of being able to access finance.

Ultimately, policy recommendations regarding the promotion of greater financial access for SMEs and trade finance in Georgia, with a focus on agri-business, will be elaborated.

The paper will be included in the ADBI’s and the CI’s working papers and will be published as a separate chapter in a book jointly published by the ADBI, the ADB and the CI.