Trillions added to small business – Kommersant

The White House recorded a record volume of purchases of state-owned companies from small and medium-sized businesses in 2022 – 7 trillion rubles. against 4.4 trillion rubles. in 2021 Such an impressive growth is associated with a sixfold expansion of the list of state-owned companies that are obliged to purchase from small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in order to generate demand for their products. Further plans to support SMEs at the expense of state-owned companies are associated with the “growing” of their own suppliers from among small businesses and with the expansion of the use of the offset contract mechanism.

In 2022, state-owned companies purchased from small and medium-sized businesses for a record 7 trillion rubles, compared to 2021, the volume of purchases increased by 60%, or 2.6 trillion rubles. Such data was presented by SME Corporation JSC on Friday to First Deputy Prime Minister Andrey Belousov at a meeting on small business support. Belousov’s secretariat confirmed the fact of the meeting and noted that it is necessary to continue to encourage state-owned companies to purchase from small and medium-sized businesses and facilitate their entry into foreign markets.

Recall that the state order is considered by the government as a key mechanism for supporting SMEs through guaranteed demand for products. At the same time, the procurement market of state-owned companies is considered more attractive for suppliers. In 2021, its total volume was estimated at 23 trillion rubles. with state purchases of 12.4 trillion rubles. (data for 2022 are incorrect due to the distortion of statistics caused by the sanctions). For this reason, the government has obliged the state JSC to give away part of its purchases to SMEs every year.

The impressive growth of last year is explained by the fact that the quota for purchases from SMEs was increased from 20% to 25% and extended to all large customers, their number amounted to 12 thousand (of which more than 9 thousand were regional) against 1.8 thousand in 2021. “More than 90% of the volume of purchases fall on companies that are within the monitoring perimeter of the SME Corporation and the regions, there are 12 thousand such companies, in total there are slightly more than 24 thousand companies under 223-FZ,” said Corporation JSC SME. The extension of the quota to regional customers ensured an increase in the volume of purchases from SMEs by 1.2 trillion rubles, the contribution of new federal customers was 1.4 trillion rubles. As a result, over 193,000 small and medium-sized businesses (80% of all suppliers under 223-FZ) became suppliers to state-owned companies.

It should be noted that during 2022 there was no clarity with the volume of supplies from SMEs for a long time – due to the closure of data on part of the purchases of the state JSC. State-owned companies could not disclose data on part of their purchases due to sanctions risks, as a result, the volume of their open part collapsed to 14.5 trillion rubles. from 22.9 trillion rubles. a year earlier. Under these conditions, state-owned companies had to report manually on purchases from SMEs based on government directives by sending aggregated data to the SME Corporation. As it turned out, in 2022, sanctioned customers slightly increased their purchases from SMEs by RUB 0.75 trillion.

Further plans to support small companies with the help of large ones are connected with the supplier “growing” program. Since last year, state JSCs have been able to provide small businesses with financial, legal, methodological and other support in order to increase the number of their qualified suppliers and thereby provide themselves with the necessary products. The SME Corporation reported that customers have already approved seven supplier “growing” programs (this was done by Russian Railways, Rostelecom, Avtodor, Rosgeologiya, Inter RAO), and another 27 state-owned companies are developing them.

Another support mechanism is offset contracts (they provide guarantees of demand from the state JSC for the products of SMEs in exchange for investments by the latter). So far, one offset has been concluded (Avtodor – Toll Roads). “Under cultivation programs and offset contracts, new or modernized small enterprises are being created that are ready to replace foreign suppliers for certain types of products. In this case, state-owned companies can become import substitution drivers. They have all the necessary resources and legislative opportunities for this,” said Alexander Isaevich, General Director of SME Corporation JSC.

Diana Galieva