New economy-revival mantra - BOIC

Over the past decades, the private sector may have received all the adulation and attention being touted as ‘the engine of growth’ but nothing significant was in action for those in the private fray who agonizingly yearned for endearing public support for the private sector in some form.


It has taken long in its coming but it’s finally here, to perhaps really do what has only been promised and painted pretty in fluid words resting in the fat policy documents. And that would be the first few words that regurgitate on lips and minds of the many who welcome the Business Opportunity and Information Centre (BOIC)’s launch.


The BOIC’s launch signals opportunities for the many who aspire to engage an occupation in the sector as entrepreneurs operating independent businesses founded on ideas long put away due to conditions that were not entirely favorable.


The Centre’s launch also shines new light of growth for the Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) to become a chief unit from the private sector contributing to the nation’s GDP.


The BOIC aims to promote 6,000 SMEs in a five year duration and this should be seen only in the positive light that it is meant to be presented. The SMEs business entities anywhere in the world are seen as sources that provides employment to a good number of people.


Here in the country it will most definitely add to reducing unemployment and present options to the many (youths especially) who remain jobless even after months and years of graduation from their respective schools and universities.


And this is exactly the same social malaise the country has witnessed for some time now owing largely due to the absence of a prominent SMEs sector. The need to import products as basic in their nature from other countries is also been due to the absence of sufficiently-supported SMEs who could chip in enough to provide what can be generated in-country. Eventually this would only shell out to even the odds in the nation’s balance of trade. The end result is easily a much stronger and more stable economy.

With the BOIC now in action, many aspiring and eager wannabe entrepreneurs are lining up for the centre’s support that is largely in the form of the Nu 8mn loan (maximum) that an individual can be entitled to.


The BOIC loan is also in favor of individuals who have till now not been able to avail financial support mainly because financial institutions are rigidly structured to cater to the big projects.


The Centre’s entry and initiation have however not been free of speculations since the day it germinated as an idea in parliamentary discourses. It was eyed as an establishment that has a relatively huge political undertone to it. Naysayers in the society were of the strong view that money might eventually go to the wrong hands.


With a majorly positive side to it, it is hoped that the BOIC achieves what it is set out for, as a nation and its economy will aptly benefit.


Published as Business Bhutan Editorial on August 30, 2014