Events

SME Initiative Working Group

November 16, 2012 | Cambridge,  MA

IPA’s SME Initiative, in collaboration with Private Enterprise Development in Low-Income Countries (PEDL), held its second Working Group in Cambridge, MA – a full-day event that brought together 41 researchers, practitioners and donors to discuss early-stage research and potential new projects pertaining to SME policy and entrepreneurship. The Working Group provided an opportunity for affiliates of the SME Initiative and PEDL to share their work, discuss potential areas for collaboration, and network with others active in the SME space. 

A diverse array of presentations covered topics including, among others, the agenda and opportunities for collaboration with the new SME Finance Forum, the impact of exporting on quality and production of goods in Egyptian SME clusters, innovative platforms for third party contract enforcement, mobile solutions for improving SME management, credit constraints faced by coffee farmers, mobile salary payments in Afghan firms, and demand building and export dynamics in Chinese footwear firms.  

Presenters included:

Impact and Policy Conference: Evidence in Governance, Financial Inclusion, and Entrepreneurship

August 30 - September 1, 2012 | Bangkok, Thailand

The Asian Development Bank, in conjunction with Innovations for Poverty Action and the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab, presents the Impact and Policy Conference: Evidence in Governance, Financial Inclusion, and Entrepreneurship  to share findings in three topic areas of development: Financial Inclusion, Governance and Post-Conflict Recovery, and SME Development.

The Impact and Policy Conference featured presentations sharing results from rigorous research studies and their policy implications by leading development economists, practitioners, and policymakers. The SME presentations and discussions took place on the first day of the conference.

Presenters Included:

First Annual Conference on Entrepreneurship and SME Development 

November 30, 2011 | Washington DC

The SME Initiative hosted its First Annual Conference on Entrepreneurship and SME Development on November 30, 2011.  Co-hosted by the Inter-American Development Bank’s Multilateral Investment Fund, this event brought together over 130 researchers, practitioners and policymakers focused on entrepreneurship and SMEs in emerging markets.  Presentations on past and ongoing research studies covered a range of topics related to access to managerial human capital, access to finance, and job creation with evidence from a number of countries, including Ghana, India, Mexico, Peru and Sri Lanka.  Practitioner perspectives on each of these topical areas were also presented, to facilitate a dialogue between the worlds of research and policy.  The event concluded with a panel discussion on “Why should we care about the ‘Missing Middle’?”  

Presenters included:

SME Initiative Working Group

September 16, 2011 | Cambridge, MA

IPA’s SME Initiative held its first Working Group – a full-day event brought together 41 researchers, practitioners and donors to discuss early-stage research and potential new projects pertaining to SME policy and entrepreneurship.  The Working Group provided an opportunity for affiliates of the SME Initiative to share their work, discuss potential areas for collaboration, and network with others active in the SME space. 

A diverse array of presentations covered topics including: the G20 Financial Inclusion agenda for SME finance; the impact of SME growth on poverty reduction; innovative risk-based pricing for SMEs; secured transactions reform in Colombia and its impact on increasing access to finance for SMEs; network spillovers in Uganda and technology spillovers in Pakistan; entrepreneurial career trajectories in Indonesia; and procurement value chains in post-conflict states. 

Presenters included:

Summaries and copies of these presentations can be viewed here.

The next Working Group meeting for SME Initiative affiliates will be held in mid-2012.