Transcript No Slide Title

EUROPEAN ACTIONS FOR
WOMEN ENTREPRENEURS
SMEs and Women’s Entrepreneurship Policy
Istanbul 19 June 2009
ANNA DANTI
Enterprise and Industry Directorate-General
SMEs in Europe
• SMEs backbone of European growth and
creators of jobs
• Objective of the EU’s SME policy actions:
promote successful entrepreneurship and improve
the business environment for SMEs
• 23 million SMEs in Europe
• average size : 5 persons
• 2/3 of total employment (>100 million jobs)
• 99.8% of all enterprises
• 90% of all enterprises: micro enterprises
EU / US attitudes towards entrepreneurship
What do you prefer - employee or self-employed?
100
percent
80
US selfemployed
61
60
40
45
EU selfemployed
20
0
2000
2001
2002
Source: Flash Eurobarometer 192, December 2006 - January 2007
Base: all respondents
2003
2004
2007
Top 2 fears in the EU
If you were to set up a business today, which are
the 2 risks you would be most afraid of?
60
percent
50
40
21
30
20
10
18
30
2nd mention
1st mention
20
0
Possibility of going
bankrupt
Uncertainty of the income
Source: Flash Eurobarometer 192, December 2006 - January 2007
Base: all respondents
Main difficulties faced by SMEs
Number of most frequent replies in Commission study 2008
0
Adminstrative burden
Access to finance
Taxation
Lack of skills
Access to public procurement
20
40
60
80
100
120
140
Role of the European Commission
• Coordinate actions of Member States
 Follow-up of MS performance
SBA
 Good Practice exchange
• Provide support to SMEs
 Financial instruments
 Support programmes and services
• Ensure EU policies / programmes are
SME friendly (better regulation)
WOMEN ENTERPRENEURS
• At the heart of the Lisbon strategy: ensure
that the proportion of women in active
employment exceeds 60% by 2010
• The entrepreneurial potential of women
constitutes an underdeveloped source of
economic growth and of new jobs
PROMOTING WOMEN ENTERPRENEURS
IS WISE AND NECESSARY
• Women constitute, on average, 30% of entrepreneurs in
the EU.
• They often face greater difficulties than men in starting up
businesses and in accessing finance and training.
• It is essential to provide women the support they need in
order to start-up and manage their own enterprise.
Access to finance, Information and Exchange,
Assistance
1. ACCESS TO FINANCING
• SMEs continue to face difficulties when applying for loans and they
often have no sufficient collateral to provide to their financial
institutions.
• The Commission has increased significantly is financial support
through the COMPETITIVENESS AND INNOVATION
PROGRAMME (CIP) 2007 – 2013.
• This programme offers new guarantee instruments to boost the
availability of equity and mezzanine finance for SMEs.
ACCESS TO FINANCING (cont)
• The financial instruments are managed by the
European Investment Fund through intermediary
financial institutions.
• 1 b EUR earmarked via CIP for 2007-2013
• 400 000 SMEs benefited: ~90% micro SMEs
• They mainly include the SME loan guarantee
facility and the micro-credit guarantee facility.
CIP: Financial Instruments
Commission
budget
European Investment
Fund (EIF)
EIB & own funds
Funding sources
EIF selects its
financial
intermediaries
based on capability,
history and solidity
Guarantees
Invests
Guarantor
Bank
Lends
SMEs
Venture capital
fund
Invests
SMEs
2. NETWOKING
1. The European Network to Promote
Women’s Entrepreneurship (WES)
2. Co-operation with business
organisations of women entrepreneurs
3. Women’s entrepreneurship portal
2.1.THE EUROPEAN NETWORK TO PROMOTE
WOMEN’S ENTREPRENEURSHIP (WES)
• launched in June 2000
• It is composed of government
representatives responsible for the
promotion of women entrepreneurship.
• It has 30 members from the European
Union, EEA and candidate countries.
WES NETWORK
• Co-operation and exchange of information
with DG Enterprise and Industry on
specific programmes, research, collection
of information, exchange of good practices
• Meetings twice a year
• Annual activity report
• Advice on future policy orientation
2.3. WOMEN’S ENTREPRENEURSHIP
PORTAL
Provides links to the websites of women entrepreneurs’
representative organisations, networks, projects and events
that relate to the promotion of female entrepreneurship.
• The information on 5 areas:
 National organisations of women entrepreneurs
 International organisations of women entrepreneurs
 Networks
 Projects
 Events related to women entrepreneurship
3. A Small Business Act
for Europe
• A set of 10 politically binding principles and
actions to implement them
• A package of concrete measures (legislative and
non-legislative)
• An implementation mechanism embedded in the
Lisbon strategy
10 politically binding principles
1.
Create an environment in which entrepreneurs and family businesses
can thrive and entrepreneurship is rewarded.
This includes
-
the creation of network of female entrepreneurship ambassadors,
-
mentoring schemes for women to set-up their own business and
- encourage entrepreneurship amongst women graduates
2.
Ensure that honest entrepreneurs who have faced bankruptcy quickly
get a second Chance
3.
Design rules according to the “Think Small First” principle
4.
Make public administrations responsive to SMEs’ needs
5.
Facilitate SMEs’ participation in P. Procurement and better use State
Aid possibilities for SMEs
Principles (ctd.)
6.
Facilitate SMEs’ access to finance and develop an
environment supportive to timely payments in
commercial transactions
7.
Help SMEs to benefit more from the opportunities
offered by the Single Market
8.
Promote the upgrading of skills in SMEs and all forms
of innovation
9.
Enable SMEs to turn environmental challenges into
opportunities
10. Encourage and support SMEs to benefit from the
growth of markets
Legislative measures
• Already adopted
• General Block Exemption Regulation on State Aids (GBER)
Enable state aid for small enterprises newly created by female
entrepreneurs
• Regulation providing for a Statute for a European Private
Company (SPE)
• Directive on reduced VAT rates (locally supplied services)
As part of the SBA will also be prepared:
• A legislative proposal to simplify rules on VAT invoicing
• An amendment to the Directive 2000/35/EC on late payments
Study on women ınnovators and
entrepreneurshıp
• Women are lagging behind on innovative
entrepreneurship and encounter specific challenges.
• Women’s ideas for innovation are as marketable as
men’s, but…
• Innovative ideas are not recognised by
predominantly male stakeholders.
• Stereotypes about women in innovative sectors and
difficulties in balancing work and family still persist.
• Stakeholders not aware of women’s different needs
and there are no measures attempting to attract
women.
THE WAY TO IMPROVEMENT
Systematic intervention should tackle:
-
contextual obstacles (i.e. running informative events and providing
entrepreneurship training in schools and universities, challenging
stereotypes by raising awareness on women’s contribution in
entrepreneurship.),
-
economic obstacles (i.e. access to capital to develop and growth
their business ideas), and
-
soft obstacles: (access to business networks, business training, role
models and entrepreneurship skills).
Nature and type of challenges are
consistent across Member States.
Enterprise Europe Network
•
EU Network offering high quality
services to the benefit of SMEs
 Organizing business cooperation
across boarders
 Help accessing EU projects and
funding
 Advising on EU legislation,
standards and intellectual property
rights
 Assist SMEs in raising their
innovative capacities
 Collecting SME feedback
 more than 500
regional
organisations
 more than 4.000
experienced
professionals
 active in 40
European countries
Enterprise Europe Network
•
EU Network offering high quality
services to the benefit of SMEs
 Organizing business cooperation
across boarders
 Help accessing EU projects and
funding
 Advising on EU legislation,
standards and intellectual property
rights
 Assist SMEs in raising their
innovative capacities
 Collecting SME feedback
 more than 500
regional
organisations
 more than 4.000
experienced
professionals
 active in 40
European countries
Information and Contacts
•
WOMEN'S ENTREPRENEURSHIP PORTAL
http://europa.eu.int/comm/womenentr.htm
•
THE EUROPEAN NETWORK TO PROMOTE WOMEN'S
ENTREPRENEURSHIP : WES
http://europa.eu.int/comm/enterprise/entrepreneurship/craft/craft-women/wes.htm
[email protected]
Fax : +32 – 2 - 29 66278
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Information and Contacts
•
•
•
•
•
SME Portal
http://ec.europa.eu/enterprise/sme/index_en.htm
SBA
http://ec.europa.eu/enterprise/entrepreneurship/sba_en.htm
Entrepreneurship
http://ec.europa.eu/enterprise/sme/promoting_en.htm
Directorate-General for Enterprise and Industry
http://ec.europa.eu/enterprise/index_en.htm
European SME Week
http://ec.europa.eu/enterprise/policies/entrepreneurship/sme-week/