The Problems And Prospects Of Small Scale Business In South-Eastern Nigeria (A Selected Study

Abstract

Nigeria gained independence from (Britain) her colonial master in '1960 with a population that was characterized by few educated people, little technological know how, highly unskilled labour force, etc. This is . because of the unwillingness of the British people to lay a foundation for the acquisition of scientific and technological knowledge. They saw Nigeria as their source of mineral and material resources, extracting and exporting her mineral and material resources which they would refine and also use some in the production of goods which they would return and -sold to Nigerians again. They owned virtually all the businesses in the 'country these include: small, medium and large scale concerns. The trend kept going on until 1972; there was emergence of "enterprises promotion decree" which revoked foreign ownership and control of specified classes of business. Many foreign businessmen left and this le~ -to capital flight and absence of technological know how. The indigenous citizens with little education and relative adequate capital needed to operate such business profitably. Because of the absence of technological know how Nigeria resorted to massive importation to meet local demand and this resulted to Nigeria having more traders buying products from abroad and selling to local consumers. As at that time Nigeria was making a lot of money from crude oil but at a time, the nation realized she needed to find another source of generating revenue. O~ing to that Nigerian government, took a giant step by investing huge ' amount of money in establishing large scale businesses so as to be . '. ,..~ prp.q,qCing goods locally for her citizens so as to reduce dependency on h~r)~~lonial master. But the effort could not yield expected result as th.ois~lJarge concerns continued to incure loss. Few privately owned fir~s .with less investment were found to be doing better than those gqv/~[nment establishments, it was then that government realized that srn~l' f1 scale business could be the vital link in their quest for teRhnqlogical advancement and economic growth. Small scale business th,9.~gh a favored option has some setbacks. This study therefore focused on critically surveying the problems and prospects facing the small .scale businesses in Nigeria with particular reference to a number o('$el~cted small scale businesses in South, Eastern states of Nigeria. Chapter one presented an introduction to the work; the objective and purpose of the study. Chapter two reviewed available literature related to the topic. Pointing out the types of business that could be run on small scale, their importance. the problems they encounter, their prospects in the economy as a whole and those peculiar to south eastern stales of Nigeria among other issues raised. Chapter three dwelt on the research UNIVERSITY OF NIGERIA NSUKKA methodology employed in the study. It discussed the various sources of data used, the sample from which information was extracted and the reasonability of using such samples. Chapter four provided presentation and analysis of the collected data, testing of research hypothesis and summary and review of main findings. Finally, chapter five summarized the findings of the research , offers recommendations and conclusion