Politicians and business leaders unite to encourage more SMEs to export

POLITICIANS and business leaders have urged more SMEs to begin exporting in order to secure long term both for themselves and the wider UK economy.

Launching Export Week in Birmingham, Trade Minister Lord Green said the national challenge facing the UK was to rebalance the economy and ensure the country could start paying its way again.

He said a debt-fuelled economy was not sustainable and one of the best ways of achieving a turnaround was to increase the volume of exports. However, he said while support measures were in place to help firms achieve their goal it was still likely to be a “long slog”.

Traditional markets in the Eurozone and the United States had been flat for some time and the minister said the best opportunities for growth lay with the emerging and fast growing economies of Asia, Latin America and Africa.

Firms needed to take advantage of opportunities in two key areas – the urbanisation of these growing economies and the emergence of a burgeoning middle class in those countries.

So far as urbanisation is concerned, he said big infrastructure projects involving roads, railways, ports, airports, power generation and off-shore development all offered opportunities for British firms to either work directly or get involved in the various supply chains.

These economies in turn, are all creating new middle classes. Income levels are rising and the aspirations of the population mean a growing demand for the high quality lifestyle goods that Britain produces.

He said this extended across all levels of the economy to products and services. In respect to automotive, he said Jaguar Land Rover was the second largest exporter of vehicles to China after BMW and that JLR simply could not produce its products quickly enough to meet demand.

“There may be short term blips but there will be faster growth patterns as they look to raise living standards. These opportunities will last well into the next generation,” said Lord Green.

New SME exporters were likely to see a 30% productivity increase in the first year, he added, with data suggesting that companies which did export successfully grew faster, generated more wealth and created new jobs.

Lord Green said the Government had done what it could to help with the export drive and had beefed up the proposition offered by both UKTI and UK Export Finance to help firms with their plans.

Paul Noon, regional director of UKTI in the West Midlands, said the agency was already working with a number of firms and the successful strategies it had encouraged had seen China become the region’s biggest trading partner – the only region in the country where this was happening.

David Godfrey, chief executive of UK Export Finance said his agency planned to double the number of regional export finance advisors it employed and had new financial support measures in place to ease the burden on new exporters.

Stewart Towe, managing director of Hadley Industries and chairman of the Black Country LEP, said experience had taught him that successful exporting was one of the best ways to secure long-term growth and it was a strategy he was now encouraging the LEP to adopt.

“However, to achieve success we all need to get involved and I would urge all firms and intermediaries to do so,” he said.