The Mohammed Bin Rashid Establishment for SME Development (MBRE), an agency of the Department of Economic Development, has signed a deal with the Dubai Statistics Center (DSC) to collect and analyze statistics on the emirate’s SMEs.

This follows the successful launch of the first official definition of SMEs of Dubai, said a statement from MBRE.

With the availability of SME statistics, the government of Dubai will now be able to publish and share SME statistics and research that will bring the Dubai SME agenda a notch higher, it said.

It will also help other stakeholders understand the SME sector more objectively. The SME statistics will also help the government baseline and landscape the SME sector for future strategic plans and policies as part of the larger economic development agenda of Dubai, the statement added.

Abdul Baset Al Janahi, MBRE chief executive officer, and Aref Obaid Al Muhairi, executive director, DSC agreed that sharing information and conducting specific research on the state of Dubai’s SME sector could dramatically change how we approach, and formulate policies for the development of the sector.

'Small and medium enterprises account for up to 98.5 per cent of Dubai's companies and 61 per cent of the total workforce,' said Al Janahi, 'and working with the DSC is an excellent way to understand the state of the SME sector and its characteristics.'

'This is a great initiative to gather data on the most important sectors in the economy. The SME statistics will capture data by employment size and turnover, and by the three key sectors of Trading, Manufacturing and Services,' he noted.

A key aspect of the data sets will be to calculate the SME value-add contribution over the last few years as a percentage of Dubai’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and see what the growth trends and patterns of the SME sector are like,' he added.

Such SME statistics will be the first of its kind in Dubai and the UAE. It will be a start to develop more complex statistics on SMEs over time. The statistics centre will support the research through a series of surveys, studies and consultations.

Al Muhairi described the collaboration as the perfect way for the DSC to play a role in gathering economic data.

'The MBRE for SME Development is known as a great institution for the development and growth of small and medium sized businesses and we our delighted to support that.'

'It's an exciting challenge for us and we will work side by side with the MBRE to provide the most accurate findings,' he added.

According to the MoU, the Dubai Statistics Center will provide statistical data and reports about SMEs for MBRE through a special screen within the electronic statistical system starting from 2011.

For a start, the MBRE and DSC will begin the process of mining the existing database to analyze and publish the first Dubai SME statistical bulletin by the middle of 2010, he added.-TradeArabia News Service