PRESIDENT Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. on Wednesday asked the member states of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and the region’s commerce to support “Nano businesses.”
In his intervention during the ASEAN Leaders’ Interface with Representatives of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations-Business Advisory Council (ASEAN-BAC), Marcos said Nano businesses, an informal and still unrecognized business category, has been impacting lives of people in the region everyday but somehow ignored.
“These Nano businesses are also described as ‘solopreneurs’ and they are home-based businesses, among whom are make-up artists, vulcanizers, independent dispatch riders, vendors, repairers, and market women and men in the various open markets,” Marcos told the ASEAN-BAC gathering.
“They play a very important but often unrecognized role all across our countries. But by classification, they often do not meet the MSME (micro, small and medium enterprise) micro-business criteria, which is the category for the smallest businesses. They are largely unaccounted for, but these informal business settings constitute a large portion of all our economies,” he added.
Marcos appealed on the ASEAN not to forget the Nano businesses, as they are just as viable as micro, small, or midsize businesses. He stressed that by supporting the informal business enterprise, they will contribute to the region’s overall economic growth and narrow the development gap.
ASEAN Business Advisory Council (ASEAN-BAC) Chair Mohammad Arsjad Rasjid Prabu Mangkuningrat supported President Marcos’ call to recognize and support nano businesses. Mangkuningrat is also the Chairman of the Indonesian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KADIN).
The ASEAN has kept its position as the fifth largest economy in the world in 2021 with US$3.3 trillion of combined gross domestic product (GDP) of the 10 ASEAN member states.
Intra-ASEAN trade continue to hold the largest share of ASEAN total trade contributing 21.3 percent to total merchandise trade in the region in 2021, constituting 21.7 percent and 20.9 percent shares of ASEAN’s total merchandise exports, respectively.
