BEST PRACTICES

DESCRIPTION:Government organizations such as SMBA, Korea Customs Service, the Ministry of Trade, Industry, and Energy, and SME-support organizations such as Korea Federation of SMEs are working closely together to implement various policies to support Korean SMEs to make proper use of FTAs.

DESCRIPTION:Singapore shared its experience in building a vibrant e-commerce business environment. The growth of e-commerce market, especially in ASEAN, had brought about new opportunities for retailers. Singapore had developed 3 strategies – build enterprise e-commerce capabilities, strengthen infrastructure and network for economies of scale and help retailers capture e-commerce market potential. Government could support retailers by developing the digital infrastructure and facilitate retailer’s partnership with private sectors in developing e-commerce platforms. On the other hand, retailers had to strengthen its e-commerce capabilities and capture market opportunities presented by the established network of partners, especially in APEC.

DESCRIPTION:The main goal of the research is to systemize the practices of APEC economies in the field of cooperation of SMEs with corporate and public sector. The typical barriers that SMEs face in their cooperation with corporate and public sectors as suppliers are mostly related to financial issues. At the same time corporations and public sector identified limited production capacities, insufficient quality standards, incomparability of technical tools and difficulties in communication with foreign partners as the main barriers. The survey also reveals information on opportunities for foreign SMEs to participate in public procurement; share of SME in public procurement, special regulations for access of SMEs; systemized open source of information online available for SMEs.

DESCRIPTION:The elaboration of a Consensus Framework for Multi-Stakeholder Ethical Collaboration in the biopharmaceutical and medical device sectors, brought together relevant actors in healthcare system under a common platform. The Framework was endorsed under the APEC Nanjing Declaration.

DESCRIPTION:The APEC SME Internationalization Model Indices was developed per individual economy as well as APEC as the whole thanks to the data collected through pilot studies from 5 member economies. As for analysis, the SME internationalization was examined in terms of the economy-industry-firm size aspect, the diversity-intensity relationship and the major determinants. Major research results included: 1) The larger the firm size, the higher the internationalization level of SMEs; 2) The diversity of SME internationalization is generally higher than the Intensity across all economies; and 3) Firm size, R&D, export history, openness and industry characteristics matter for SME internationalization, but readiness to market advance and government support have little or significant impact on internationalization. In order to share the results of the project and to discuss ways to globalize SMEs in the APEC region, Korea’s Small and Medium Business Administration (SMBA) and Small and medium Business Corporation(SBC) hold a workshop in Seoul, Korea in October 2016 (SME 05 2016S)

DESCRIPTION:APEC e-commerce forum was held from November 26 to 28, 2015 in Jeju city, Korea. The purpose of the event was to provide a place to discuss the e-commerce industry for industry experts and policy makers. This forum contributed to increasing people’s understanding about the e-commerce industry, and sharing the most up-to-date information on the e-commerce industry.

DESCRIPTION:Simple, easy and free-of-charge business licensing for micro and small enterprises (MSE).The license provides protection for MSE in doing businesses at the designated location, access to business mentoring, and access to financial sources by registering and opening saving account at the government owned banks. Since the first launched of the initiatives in 2015, 175,646 business licenses were issued and 12,643 new saving accounts were opened at the BRI (Government owned bank).

DESCRIPTION:To enhance entrepreneurial activity in Russia and to increase the visibility and accessibility of support to SMEs, the Joint-Stock Company Russian Small and Medium Business Corporation (RSMB Corporation) was established in 2015. There are five main activity areas: (i) Providing better access to procurement of companies with state ownership, (ii) SMEs financing support including loans and guarantee support, (iii) Information and marketing support, (iv) Property support, and (v) Legal support. A 10% quota for procurement from SMEs was established by law for the companies with state ownership, which is monitored by RSMB Corporation. As the result, product range of state-owned companies available for SMEs has increased by 26 times. National Guarantee System (NGS) based on 3-level model of MSME credit guarantee support was established. If the companies have projects in priority sectors of Russian economy, RSMB Corporation implements a special Program that fixes interest rate on loans amount from 740 thousand USD at 11% for small companies and at 10% for medium-sized companies. Due to the specific features of Russian SMEs and short history of private business in Russia there was specially designed Business Navigator – a web tool for businesses. Its goal is to help the entrepreneur to find the proper location and the proper type of business to start and where to address to receive information, finance, property and legal support.

DESCRIPTION:Dare a focal agency to nurture and support SME development in Brunei. This is part of Brunei Government’s new initiatives to provide an effective and attractive ecosystem to spur and stimulate positive growth of Brunei SMEs.

DESCRIPTION:In regard of supporting SMEs through the strengthening of the market and accessibility to finance, Indonesia established the Marketing Services Agency (LLP‐KUKM) and the Revolving Fund Agency (LPDB KUMKM). LLP‐KUKM aims to strengthen the promotion and marketing of products existing SMEs across Indonesia, by providing provincial pavilions, market information, consulting, training, etc. LPDB‐KUMKM is to ease SMEs’ access to finance, through the provision of easiness interest include flexible loans.

DESCRIPTION:Peru introduced five steps to achieve the objective of increasing productivity and reducing productive heterogeneity among firms: (i) Promote access to government procurement through the National initiative to enhance micro and small firms during the international crisis; (ii) Promote Innovation; (iii) Promote internalization, in which e‐Commerce is a facilitating tool; (iv) Promote value added to access to government procurement markets; and (v) Look for sustainability and growth through to maintain a regular/minimum amount of public procurement to enhance the SMEs improve their productivity and look for other markets.

DESCRIPTION:An one‐day forum focused on identifying the barriers to trade in health care products was held on June 8, 2015 in Atlanta, the United States. In the forum, public and private sector participants discussed the barriers to trade in the health care sector that significantly hinders access to safe and effective medical products. Speakers from a range of government agencies and industry representatives highlighted experiences exporting and importing in the health care sector, and emphasized that many of these barriers disproportionately impact SMEs.