A Critical Role

Across the world, small to medium enterprise (SME) occupies a critical role in any healthy society and economy. SMEs provide the majority of global jobs. They pay the largest share of tax, supporting essential infrastructure from which everyone benefits. They enable mothers and fathers to provide healthy food, clothing and housing for their children, and the necessary freedom to gain an education. They buttress the concept of responsible personal property ownership and contribute in a multitude of ways to the formation of stable public institutions and practices. Through relationships with suppliers (often other SMEs) and customers, the multiplier effect of one SME ripples through the entire community and beyond.

Conversely, parts of the world at greatest risk of economic and social decay, and, frequently experiencing great environmental and spiritual degradation, are those where the SME sector is at greatest risk or of little prominence. At the best of times, birthing and growing a small-medium business is difficult and carries a high risk. SME business owners are often under-supported and ignored. At worst, SMEs are vulnerable to exploitation and extortion, exposed and vulnerable to external circumstances beyond their control.

Consequently, especially in a Christian-owned and managed SME, where BAM is the driving force, the opportunity for enhanced demonstration, proclamation and extension of the Kingdom of God through daily, legitimate, credible, life-on-life, real-time, real-world interaction with people in all walks of life is profound.

In the TSME footprint, the typical business in which we invest has 10-50 employees (sometimes fewer, and often substantially more). Annual revenues would generally be USD 200k – USD 2m (again, sometimes less, and frequently significantly greater). In purchasing power terms, and considering metrics for the typical low to middle income countries in the footprint, as a general rule of thumb one can multiply this revenue by a factor of 10X or more to get a comparable picture for SMEs in more developed economic contexts with which they might be familiar.