Published Online:June 2025
Product Name:The IUP Journal of Entrepreneurship Development
Product Type:Article
Product Code:IJED040625
DOI:10.71329/IUPJED/2025.22.2.68-80
Author Name:Amina Bello, Taiwo Adewale Muritala and May Ifeoma Nwoye
Availability:YES
Subject/Domain:Management
Download Format:PDF
Pages:68-80
Like in other nations, Nigeria’s small and medium enterprises (SMEs) are important forces behind development. Their contribution to poverty alleviation cannot be overstated, as they have a noticeable impact on boosting employment, developing local technology and skills, encouraging innovation and entrepreneurship, increasing exports, and laying the groundwork for a variety of manufacturing sectors. In order to better understand how SMEs in Nigeria function and the obstacles they encounter in their efforts to promote inclusive economic growth and poverty alleviation, this study examined the effects of SME financing on poverty reduction in Nigeria. With an emphasis on SME financing operations inside the Nigerian ecosystem, the study collected data from secondary sources and used an ex post facto methodology. Establishing the potential of SMEs to reduce poverty in Nigeria by promoting inclusive growth and economic development was the study’s main goal. Additionally, the complementary role of optimized institutional capacity, government commitment, and infrastructure-based and financial support for subsector’s growth was examined.
Being a source of high employment and rapid increase in real Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in almost every nation or state, the small and medium enterprises (SMEs) subsector is crucial to a country’s economic success. SMEs have rightfully been dubbed “the engine of growth” and “catalysts for socioeconomic transformation of any country” due to their important contributions to the expansion and development of diverse economies (Ali et al., 2020).