BAKU, Azerbaijan, Aug.3
By Nargiz Sadikhova - Trend:
Minister of National Economy of Kazakhstan Asset Irgaliyev reported on measures to support small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) this year at a Government meeting chaired by Prime Minister Askar Mamin, Trend reports.
“Over the first half of this year, more than 31,000 SME projects worth over 1 trillion tenge (2.4 billion) received concessional funding,” Irgaliyev said.
Besides, to support entrepreneurs in the sectors of the economy affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, loans to the SMEs are refinanced, and the list of economic activities was significantly expanded. The subsidy period was extended by 3 months. For these purposes, 18.4 billion tenge ($43 million) has been allocated from the budget.
In July of this year, 13.2 billion tenge ($31 million) was additionally allocated from the budget to subsidize new business projects within the framework of the Business Roadmap and Economy of Simple Things programs. The total amount of funding for the two programs amounted to 186.3 billion tenge ($440 million).
Moreover, in July, micro-crediting of graduates of the Bastau-Business project of the Employment Roadmap program was started. It’s planned to finance 5,000 projects of new rural entrepreneurs. For these purposes, 22.5 billion tenge ($53 million) has been allocated.
At the end of the first half of 2021, within the Business Roadmap 2025 and Economy of Simple Things programs 12,447 projects were subsidized for a total of 441 billion tenge ($1.04 billion), guarantees were provided for 10,788 projects worth 187 billion tenge ($440 million).
Within the programs of the Agrarian Credit Corporation, 134 projects were supported for the amount of loans of 5.9 billion tenge ($14 million).
As for tax incentives, from January 1 of this year, a new special retail tax regime was introduced with a rate of 3 percent on income received in the affected industries.
From April 1 to July 1, 2021, deferrals were provided for the payment of taxes from the payroll in the affected industries.
“Since July 1 of this year, we have granted the right to an additional VAT offset of 70 percent for newly created manufacturing companies, the cost of protective equipment provided to employees of business entities are exempted from the individual income tax,” Irgaliyev added.
The minister noted that in order to considerably reduce the burden on business and to form an effective regulatory system, new approaches have been developed to regulate entrepreneurial activity ‘on scratch’. They provide for the improvement of the basic principles of interaction between the state and business, the conditions for establishing requirements, the institution of regulatory appeal, the experimental legal regime, register of mandatory requirements, the automation of reporting, the improvement of state control, and the exclusion of the use of retroactive legal acts for business. The corresponding bill is under consideration in the parliament.