ASMED
Organizes Workshop on Global Entrepreneurship Monitor 2024 Report

Muscat, 20 May
(ONA) — The Authority for Small and Medium Enterprises Development (ASMED) today
organized a workshop to review the Sultanate of Oman’s results in the Global
Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) 2024 report.

The workshop
was titled “Towards Empowering and Sustainable Growth of Small and Medium
Enterprises in the Sultanate of Oman”. It was attended by representatives
of government units and private sector establishments.

The workshop
was opened by Qais Rashid Al Toobi, ASMED Deputy Chairman for Finance and
Investment, who explained that the workshop includes 15 working papers covering
all areas of relevance to the sector of entrepreneurship and SMEs, the
legislative environment and future plans in this field.

“ASMED joins
hands with all partners—through initiatives, programmes and other events—to
achieve partnerships to empower SMEs and the entrepreneurship sector,” said Al
Toobi, noting that the Authority offers programmes in financing, investment,
capacity building and marketing.

The workshop
reviewed efforts to motivate SMEs and enhance opportunities for partnerships
and integration among the government and private sectors, to help empower SMEs,
raise the sector’s contribution to the gross domestic product (GDP) and augment
Oman’s rankings in the GEM report.

The workshop
included papers that explored entrepreneurial ratios and indices, as well as
the outcome of GEM report 2024.

The workshop
also included specialized training sessions to empower the owners of SMEs and
help them benefit from non-traditional financing platforms.

The
workshop dealt with the index of entrepreneurship in vocational education,
colleges and universities and highlighted efforts made to establish business
centres in all governorates to empower SMEs and startups and to support technology-based
and innovation-based startups through the Promising Omani Startup Programme.

It is worth
noting that the Sultanate of Oman has achieved exceptional progress in the 2024-2025
GEM report, ranking eighth globally out of 56 countries covered by the report.

This is a
three-spot improvement from Oman’s 2023 ranking when it ranked eleventh. This
reflects ongoing efforts to enhance the entrepreneurship business environment
and support small and medium enterprises.

—
Ends/Bishara/AG