Mapping the shift in business development services Book

* shows how to make markets really work * reduces dependence on donor agencies * illustrates critical issues, new findings and radical changes with a wealth of wide-ranging material * key title for all BDS practitioners In the last 20 years, microfinance has made it possible for the first time for poor people to access reasonably priced financial services. More recently, another related revolution has started, which may have the potential to be equally dramatic. Small enterprises not only need credit —they also need many other services: training, advice, marketing, supplies, premises, accountancy, materials, technology and many others. Without them, credit alone may do no more than add the burden of debt to all the other problems entrepreneurs have to face. Governments and foreign donors have traditionally responded to these needs by trying to provide the services themselves. Despite — or because of — heavy subsidies, these services have been inadequate and of poor quality, and their main effect has been to ‘crowd out’ potentially more effective private suppliers. But policy makers are now learning that entrepreneurs are willing to pay the market price for quality services, and that small businesses — in the private sector — are the best source of services for other small businesses. The goal is to make markets work — in business services as well as in other products. The editor has selected seventeen chapters to illustrate the radical changes that have taken place in the evolution of assistance to small businesses. His introduction shows how the transformation has been inspired by the evolution of microfinance, and illustrates some of the critical issues which are facing business development practitioners today.