04 Jul 2023

Intellectual Property (IP) ecosystem is key for Small Medium Enterprises to distinguish their goods and services from their competitors.

Speaking during a two day National Intellectual Property workshop for Small and Medium Enterprises recently, the acting director of World Intellectual Property Organization, Ms Loretta Asiedu said IP was at the heart of entrepreneurs’ creativity and inventiveness.

Ms Asiedu said every product or service that was used on daily basis was the outcome of a series of their creativity and inventiveness.

“How do you ensure that innovations associated with your products are protected and not duplicated without any sanctions or consequences,” she said.

She told SMEs to protect their goods as it would help them to be more competitive and help the country achieve its development objectives of creating more jobs, strengthening sectors and developing business working models.

Ms Asiedu said the International Trade Center had noted that SME’s had employed a significant share of the working population in Botswana thereby playing a central role in its economic growth.

“Increased SMEs competitiveness would also equip them to innovate and export across borders, thereby fostering the sustainable economic development envisaged in Botswana’s Vision 2036, which recognizes the essential, role that SMEs could play in achieving this aim,” she said.

SME development, she said should be a high priority for many governments around the world because according to the World Bank, SMEs represent about 90 per cent of businesses and over 50 per cent of employment worldwide.

She however said the formal SMEs contributed up to 40 per cent of national income (GDP) in emerging economies.

“Statistics show that indeed, not only are SMEs an important segment of Botswana’s economy, but they also constitute an important group of stakeholders targeted by WIPO’s Medium Term Strategic Plan,” she said.

Also she said not only are SMEs an important segment of Botswana’s economy, but they also constitute an important group of stakeholders targeted by WIPO’s Medium Term Strategic Plan.

The business environment, she noted had become so intensely competitive hence the need to find creative and innovative ways to capture the consumer’s attention in a timely and cost effective manner.

For his part, Companies and Intellectual Property Authority (CIPA) chief executive officer, Mr Paul Masena said it was every entrepreneurs dream to see their enterprises rising beyond the SME stage, and growing into a sustainable entity with the capacity to penetrate international markets.

Mr Masena said by hosting a two-day workshop they believed that it was every entrepreneur’s dream to see their enterprise rising beyond the SME stage.

“At CIPA, we believe that continued investment into innovation and creativity, coupled with a clear intellectual property strategy, is the competitive edge that you are all looking for in order to achieve this dream,” he said.

He said it was their expectation that following the two-day engagement, the SMEs would all leave with a better understanding of how trademarks, patents, utility models and other intellectual property rights could be exploited for the benefit of their businesses.

Mr Masena pointed that it was evident that small businesses were the backbone of Botswana’s economy.

He said that the 2020 exercise undertaken by the Local Enterprise Authority (LEA), identified more than 50 000 operational SMEs, in both the formal and the informal sectors. In global terms, he said, SMEs accounted for 90 per cent of all businesses worldwide, and they were essential contributors to job creation, poverty eradication, economic development, and diversification. ends