Minister Cummins Addresses Global SME Meeting In South Africa

A call has been made for small and medium-sized enterprises (SME’s) to have a seat at the table at international fora to voice the issues that directly affect them.

Minister of Energy and Business, Senator Lisa Cummins made this appeal while addressing the International Trade Centre’s Global SME Ministerial Meeting 2025 in Johannesburg, South Africa from July 22 to 24.

“The reality of it is that many of the small and micro businesses in our countries do not sit in the G20 fora, they do not sit in the WTO, they do not sit in policy fora like these. It is important that we continue to give voice, as has been done here today by the ITC, to these agencies by bringing them to the table so they can speak for themselves about the issues they are encountering.

“But more importantly, it is critical that as we bring them to the table that national action then allows for those things to break into tangible and meaningful intervention that speaks to exactly where they are that translates policy into implementation… that translate an identification in the white paper of access to financing into a restructuring of the financial ecosystems,” Senator Cummins stated.

She told those attending the meeting which included representatives from the Barbados Small Business Association, that enhancing Micro, Small and Medium-Sized Enterprise (MSME) competitiveness was essential for sustainable development and the economic resilience of all of economies.

This she added, was especially true for small island developing states like Barbados, emphasising that MSMEs from the Caribbean needed to be competitive if they are to create jobs, generate and leverage innovation, increase domestic consumption, lower their import bills, reduce trade surpluses and export growth.

She said Barbados had placed MSME development high on the national agenda, having recently launched its new MSME strategy for 2025.

Minister Cummins noted that the issues on Barbados’ agenda for Global Ministerial SME Meeting included digital trade, the green and the blue economy, and access to inclusive and affordable financing.

Small business, she pointed out, remained among some of the most vulnerable, especially in small countries since they were vulnerable to external shocks, climate change, supply chain disruptions and global geopolitics.

The Minister also called for “a differentiated support model” to address different countries, regions and businesses across various sectors, noting that in each country, the systems exist but it was a question of how to get those systems to coexist across boundaries in order to allow SMEs to thrive and to grow.

“So if in Barbados, my team works to develop a structured approach with a small business in Barbados and can combine skills and vision with a business in Jamaica, and together they connect with a partner in South America and then export to Africa benefitting from innovative approaches to blended financing through entities like export/import banks, regional development banks and private sector firms, we can have alignment,” she said, adding:

“Agencies like the ITC and others, then in turn, can continue to build on what we started here to provide the institutional shepherding through markets, across companies, businesses and countries to build a new value and supply chain that combines businesses. With this, we can transform the national and global landscape of the SME space… there is an opportunity for us to address the outcome of affordable access to financing with a restructuring of the financial architecture.”

Minister Cummins underscored the importance of institutions such as the ITC, stating that the goal of the inaugural Ministerial SME Meeting should be to provide a “timely” opportunity for countries to share their experiences and concrete solutions, reaffirm them and execute on the need for tailored support for SMEs especially for Small Island Developing States. (PR/GIS)