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Seeking views on Govt export support package, for Startups.co.uk

Journalist: Rosie Murray-West, Freelance

ended 27. July 2023

Are you a small business that exports? Is the government doing enough to help you? What are your views on the export support being given by UK Export Finance? 

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/ukef-backs-british-exporters-with-65-billion

I'd love to know for Startups.co.uk and will mention your business in my piece

 

1 responses from the Newspage community

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Lucinda O'Reilly
Director at The International Trade Consultancy
UK Export Finance has invested £6.5 billion which has contributed £4.1 billion to the economy. Unless I'm missing something that's not a good ROI. 84% of the recipients were SMEs i.e. companies with a turnover less than £50 million and fewer than 250 employees. I'd like to know what % of the recipients were small SMEs: Fewer than 50 employees and a turnover lower than £10 million and
micro SMEs: Fewer than 10 employees and a turnover lower than €2 million. These are the companies that are really struggling to overcome the challenges to exporting. The way the support is structured often isn't actually what these small companies need as it's usually in the form of credit finance given to the customer in the export market so they can afford to buy the product from the UK company. Small businesses need money to invest in equipment or marketing so they can scale up or promote their products to new markets but they often can't access this funding for those purposes.