Appraisal of Working Capital Management of Small Firms in Enugu State

Abstract

The role of small firms to the economic recovery and self reliance of the nation cannot be talked much about. The problem of this subsector has been that of an inefficient working capital management, precisely cash problems. Small firms have been unable to meet their outstanding obligations to creditors, employees, auditors and the government; this has been attrib~ted to the lack of cash for their operations. Many government programmes have been set-up to tackle the problem of cash (liquidity) of sm~ll firms, but the implementation of these programmes, the study found out, has not been very impressive. The objectives of the study are to appraise the working capital management of small firms and compare it with the theoretical framework noting the variances, and possibly finding the solutions to the variances. Four hypotheses have been postulated for testing: to determine whether the literacy level of owner-managers do not affect the working capital management of small firms' satisfactory performance is not dependent upon an efficient working capital management; small firms do not use efficient cash management techniques; and small firms do not use efficient inventory management techniques ; ',