Nigerian Vice-President Yemi Osinbajo during the first quarter MSMEs stakeholders’ meeting, which was held at the Presidential Villa, Abuja Nigeria extended the 50 per cent discount it offered to Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises by three months to register their company names.

The  Federal Government Of Nigeria’s extension was due to the success so far recorded in the 50 per cent discount window,reports showed that small business registration grew from “54,000 to 163,000 within six months” of approving the discount.

Application of the discount began since October 2018,It involved reducing the fee for the registration of a business name from N10,000 to N5,000 which is half the price to help MSMEs formalize their operations.

The Vice President demanded both the Standard Organisation of Nigeria and National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control to hasten the resolve issues relating to the overlapping of their functions to ease business operations.

He further challenged the stakeholders to rack their brains and come up with suggestions on how best to finance small business outlets in Nigeria.“Having listened to all the issues raised in the report and from your various contributions about funding, I think you should come up with suggestions on better funding for start-ups and MSMEs.