The Ministry of Economy intends to expand monitoring of state support for small and medium-sized businesses

The Ministry of Economy intends to expand monitoring of state support for small and medium-sized businesses, taking into account not only targeted benefits aimed at small companies, but also their use of general economic measures to stimulate business. Complete knowledge of all support for SMEs is necessary for the fine-tuning of the investment and business environment in this sector – the increasing hopes of the authorities that small and medium-sized companies will take on the main risks of import substitution and ensuring technological sovereignty in the coming years add urgency to this task.

Amendments to the law “On the Development of SMEs” (209-FZ), prepared by the Ministry of Economy (published on regulation.gov.ru), expand the list of information that is accumulated in the unified register of SMEs receiving support (maintained by the Federal Tax Service). Currently, the register contains data only on specific assistance measures aimed specifically at small companies. Now it is proposed to supplement the register with information about general support mechanisms that were not developed to help the sector, but are also used by it.

The explanatory note to the bill clarifies that we are talking, for example, about preferential loans and grants. “These are, for example, grants for young entrepreneurs to start a business, grants for social entrepreneurs to start their own business, grants for tourism (for the development of tourism infrastructure, glamping and other areas of new tourist routes),” explains Dmitry Abbakumov, coordinator of “Business Russia” in the Central Federal District . The government will establish an “exhaustive list” of support measures, information on the provision of which will need to be entered into the register when the project is adopted. The Ministry of Economy told Kommersant that the goal of the project is to unify approaches to monitoring and analyzing measures to support the sector by various departments. “The initiative will also help assess how effective these measures are and how much they are in demand by business,” the ministry clarified.

Let us recall that the government came up with the idea of ​​collecting and analyzing data for operational monitoring of what is happening in the industry and targeted provision of state support during the COVID-19 pandemic. Then the crisis situation revealed the inability of SMEs to independently identify their “systemic” needs (see “Kommersant” dated March 26, 2021).

The business community supports the amendments proposed by the Ministry of Economy. Business Russia believes that the bill fits into the logic of smart regulation of the industry: “The state wants greater transparency for itself, including in the use of business support measures: who uses what and what effect these measures reliably produce.” Executive Director of Opora Russia Andrei Shubin says that the bill actually systematizes the legal regulation of the register of aid recipients. “Enrichment of registry data always has a positive effect on the effectiveness of public policy, allowing, if necessary, to adjust support priorities,” believes Mr. Shubin.

It should be noted that until now, due to the massive “targeted” support for the sector, it was perceived by the authorities somewhat separately. The proposed addition to the register by the Ministry of Economy with general assistance mechanisms looks like an attempt to consider SMEs as part of the economy. Considering the tasks that the government sets for the sector (this is primarily the replacement of foreign suppliers and innovative activity – see Kommersant on October 24), such an approach is apparently needed in order to assess the dependence of the sector on government support and the real efficiency of work small and medium-sized companies. The collected statistics can prove that sufficient financial support measures, which business prefers to other formats of assistance, have been deployed in recent years, in fact, indicating the grounds for presenting counterclaims to the sector.

Kristina Borovikova