The COVID-19 pandemic has presented a major challenge to achievement of the SDGs worldwide. For MSMEs, a crisis of the scale that we are facing now makes them both the victim and also the potential agent of change for a strong recovery. MSMEs are by far the most dominant sector in most economies.
According to UNCTAD, MSMEs comprise 90% of all business enterprises and employ 50% of the workforce. Formal MSMEs contribute 40% to GDP and the numbers can be higher, when accounting for informal MSMEs. Empretec Centers, present in 43 countries, help entrepreneurs develop and grow their businesses, create more jobs and generate economic growth including by advancing the SDGs. UNCTAD also supports member States to develop a thriving entrepreneurship ecosystem through technical assistance with the Entrepreneurship policy framework.
Entrepreneurs have an important role in the creative economy. The classical creative professions – artists, designers, musicians, and architects – have long worked as freelancers or individual entrepreneurs. With the emergence of the high-tech sharing economy, social enterprises as well as the growing number of freelancers in knowledge-intensive industries, it seems that creativity and entrepreneurship will remain intertwined for the foreseeable future.
Cultural and creative entrepreneurs have specific characteristics: they operate in difficult market conditions. They produce goods and services that are 'cultural' by nature, work with people that are often more content‐driven than commercially oriented, and they usually create very small enterprises that exist on the basis of more permanent networks. In building sustainable and just economies, the creative economy subsector of MSMEs plays a promising role.
In the context of the 2021 “International Year of Creative Economy”, the ramifications of the crisis on various creative sectors need to be better explored along with the impact of different fiscal stimulus packages on these various creative sectors and their impact on employment, education or skills enhancement, young people as well as gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls.
According to UNCTAD, the Asian region alone accounted for $228 billion of creative goods exports in 2015. During the pandemic, there are strong indications that certain subsectors of the creative economy, such as video games and streaming services, have actually grown due to public health restrictions and work from home.
This session, organized in partnership with the Permanent Mission of the Republic of Indonesia and UNCTAD on the sidelines of the ECOSOC Financing for Development forum serves as an opportunity to exchange views and experiences on the policies and strategies implemented by governments in targeted fiscal and financial stimuli for MSMEs, including players in the creative economy subsector to fill the financing gaps faced by these entrepreneurs and MSMEs. The session will also discuss the opportunities and challenges faced by creative entrepreneurs during the COVID-19 pandemic.
PANEL SESSION
Moderator: Ms. Chantal Line Carpentier, Chief UNCTAD New York Office of the Secretary-General
Welcoming Remarks:
Mr. Hari Prabowo, Director for Development, Economic and Environmental Affairs, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Indonesia
Panelists:
- Dr. Febrio Nathan Kacaribu, Head of Fiscal Policy Agency, Indonesian Ministry of Finance
- Ms. Tatiana Krylova, Head of Enterprise Branch, Division on Investment and Enterprise Development, UNCTAD
- Mr. Charles Ocici, Executive Director, Enterprise Uganda (Empretec Uganda)
- Ms. Julian Omala founder and chief executive director of Delight Uganda Limited, Women in Business Award finalist (tbc)
- Ms. Olayinka Jacobs-Bonnick, Founder South-South Art and Culture Collective in Jamaica (tbc)
