The Growth and Development of Small-Scale Enterprises among the Youth: A Case Study of Mbuga Village, Mbarara District

Abstract

This study assessed the factors that have hindered the growth and development of small scale enterprises in Mbuga village, to identify the limiting factors for the growth and development of small scale enterprises and to examine possible solutions to the slow growth and development of small scale enterprise of Mbuga village in Mbarara district. The study took a crosssectional design where both quantitative and qualitative approaches were used in the facts that provides wide range of valid responses, no limits were put to respondents, many respondents participated at the same time and also enabled the researcher to understand first, analyze and reveal data in a more meaningful way however, quantitative data was used to provide numerical analysis in terms of frequencies and percentage composition as a way of measuring incidental effects or influence between different variables. A sample size of 50 respondents was used who were expected to provide reliable findings to the study questions administered to them. The study examined the causes of slow growth and development of small scale enterprises in Mbuga village in Mbarara district and findings revealed that inadequate education and training by the business owners to their employees, poor accounting practices, higher transaction costs, lack of market opportunity, stiff competition among SME owners, lack of enabling environment like competition inadequate management like business knowledge, government policies inform of heavy taxes, inadequate land for expansion, lack of improved infrastructures inform of roads and lack of market opportunity was also revealed among the limiting factors to the growth and development of small scale and medium enterprises. The study went ahead to assess the possible solutions to the limitation to the growth and development of small scale and medium enterprises in Mbuga village in Mbarara district. The findings revealed the necessity of equitable allocation of raw materials, improvement in techniques of production, adequate funding through bank loans and subsidies, government to emphasize export strategy to widen the market, improving on government policies like imposing appropriate taxes and giving subsidies, improving on the techniques of production to replace automated equipment and ensuring customer retention through building customer loyalty.