| Abstract |
Despite the huge incentives and policy interventions for small business development instituted by the South African government over the past fifteen years, there is limited evidence of transition of informal businesses to the formal sector. Furthermore, the high rate of unemployment in the country points to the growing incapacity of mainstream small scale micro and medium enterprises (SMMEs) to address the chronic social ills of poverty, unemployment, inequality and social deprivation ravaging the country. This theoretical study renders a detailed narrative of the status, growth opportunities and current setbacks of the South African SMME sector with a view to proposing best practices of SMME development and economic sustainability. Building on the current government interventions designed to promote growth without equity, we propose that advancing a poverty-reduction approach to entrepreneurship hinges on the intersection between sustainable seed funding, commercialization of business activities, strong managerial approaches and capacity development of SMME managers' skills. Such an integrated approach strengthens the potential of SMMEs to survive the competition from established commercialized enterprises. |