ENTREPRENEURIAL CHALLENGES IN THE ESTABLISHMENT OF SMALL- SCALE INDUSTRIES IN ENUGU URBAN

The study was done to ascertain the entrepreneurial challenges in the establishment of small – scale industries in Enugu Urban. The aim was to determine the extent to which commercial banks and other financial institutions have out loans to small-scale entrepreneurs. Information was collected through (a) Questionnaires (b) Library reviews (c) Personal Observation. A total of four hundred questionnaires were distributed and two hundred and fifty collected back from five companies in the urban comprising: Herbertex Paint, Paradise Paint, Marshal Paint, Global Paint, Eme-Bus Nig Limited. Through the information gathered from the questionnaires. It was found that: small scale entrepreneurs find it difficult to raise loan from banks again, most small scale business owners enter into business without adequate knowledge of management and without proper feasibility studies about the proposed business. It was also gathered that the cost of producing some of the goods have risen to very high proportion due to government policies have not been favorable to small scale entrepreneurs especially in the areas of importation of required basic raw materials and taxation. The research also reveled that NERFUND was not helping to solve financial problems of SMES as some of these business owners were not even aware of such fund. Although, government have recognized the important of small scale industries, full attention have not yet been devoted to solving these problems. A number of measures were perceived as capable of solving the challenges posed and some recommendations based on the findings of the study were made and they include. It was suggested that banks and other financial institutions should adjust their lending habit to accommodate the competence of small-scale industries particularly in the demand for high interest rate and collateral securities, starting a business only after thorough feasibility studies have been carried out about the business, making provision for training of staff; creating an agency that will assist the small-scale industries in financial management and other matters, management consultants and those knowledgeable in account, general business should be employed. Finally, the entrepreneurs should make sure that advertisement is carried out. The government should equally provide infrastructure to enable the entrepreneurs have a conducive environment to operate on. The researcher hopes that the implementation of the above will help ease the challenges of small-scale industries in Enugu urban and Nigerian in general.