Evidence for the Development of Small and Medium Enterprises: Conference and Matchmaking Event

Evidence for the Development of Small and Medium Enterprises: Conference and Matchmaking Event

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On Tuesday November 3, 2015, IPA Peru, J-PAL LAC, the Small and Medium Enterprise (SME) Program at IPA, the Ministry of Production, the National Society of Industries of Peru (SNI) and COPEME, co-organized the Conference and Matchmaking Event "Evidence for the development of small and medium enterprises” in Lima, Peru.

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The event convened representatives of the public and private sector, civil society and researchers, with the aim of spreading the existing rigorous evidence on effective interventions for SMEs, and of identifying opportunities for collaboration to generate new research in this area. To this end, international researchers presented evidence from rigorous impact evaluations on the effectiveness of programs and services targeting SMEs around the world. Researchers also worked with local actors to generate new studies on what interventions work and which do not in the Peruvian context.

The event was divided in three panels, covering topics considered essential for the SME growth. In the first panel, researcher Stanislao Maldonado (Universidad del Rosario, Colombia) presented evidence from studies on access to finance for SMEs. In the second panel, Jeanne Lafortune (Pontifical Catholic University of Chile), presented studies focusing on the development of human capital and management skills for SMEs. Finally, in the third panel, Daniel Xu (Duke University) and Matthew Bird (Universidad del Pacífico, Peru) presented insights from interventions to facilitate access to markets by SMEs. The evidence presented by these leading researchers was discussed by implementers of services, or interventions in each panel’s thematic area.

During the afternoon, researchers and implementers participated in a matchmaking workshop. In this workshop, researchers presented their areas of interest in terms of academic research, while implementers presented the services or programs aimed at SMEs that they are implementing. Based on this, both groups worked together to define common interests and opportunities for collaboration, as well as strengthen their ties to design and test innovative solutions to the problems SMEs face in Peru. This will generate evidence on the effectiveness of these interventions, in order to feed existing programs and inform future ones.

The event is organized by IPA Perú, J-PAL LAC and the SME Program at IPA, as part of its mission to promote evidence-based decision-making and public policy.