Assessment Of Micro-finance On The Performance of SME's

The study explores the effects of Micro-finance Institutions (MFIs) on the growth of small and medium enterprises in the Sunyani Municipality. Under this, objectives of the study included; to provide a profile of SMEs of Sinapi Aba Savings and Loans(SASL), outline the products and services SASL offer for SMEs and to examine the effect of SASL on SMEs growth. The findings of the study reveal that significant number of the SMEs benefited from the loans and other services, majority of the SMEs also acknowledge positive impact of SASL services towards increasing their sales, savings, profits and management skills etc. However, major challenges identified were delay in service provision, higher interest rates etc. From the research, we recommended that MFIs need to improve assistance given to SMEs by disbursing loan / other services on time, increasing loan sizes, making loan conditions flexible and reducing interest rates charge on loans to drive economic development.