Commission missing the point on 'Small Business Act', SMEs say 

More than a third of the respondents to the SBA consultation cited administrative burdens as their biggest obstacle, the Commission report stated, followed by access to funding, taxation and lack of knowledge. 

84% said that educational systems were not sufficiently adapted to entrepreneurship and the needs of SMEs in particular, saying that this was due to the "poor image" of this field in general. 

SMEs also stressed the high costs of patents as the main obstacle in the field of intellectual property. 

Moreover, the consultation revealed their need for better information on public contracts and better training on how to prepare for these. 

The SBA consultation, launched by the Commission end of January, aimed to kick off an open debate with all stakeholders on identifying the needs and obstacles SMEs face in Europe. 

The consultation has drawn heavy criticism from the industry representatives including the European Association of Craft, Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises (UEAPME), which says the Commission asked questions to which it should already know the answers, rather than addressing the most pressing issue: whether or not the SBA must be binding. 

The organisation had warned that the SBA is the "last chance for the EU to deliver a concrete answer to small businesses' needs before the next Parliamentary elections and before the end of the current Commission's mandate". 

The SBA's main objective is to put small and medium-sized enterprises at the forefront of decision-making in the EU and to introduce concrete measures to unlock their growth potential. The Commission plans to unveil the SBA in June. 

Along with Slovenian Economy Minister Andrej Vizjak, Industry Commissioner Günther Verheugen expressed his hope that the SBA will mark a shift in the focus of European job creation policies from industry to SMEs, which represent the "backbone" of the European economy, according to Vizjak. 

According to Eurostat data, 99.8% of the almost 20 million enterprises active in the EU 27 within the non-financial business economy are small and medium-sized enterprises.