[{"bbox": [96, 153, 1135, 363], "category": "Text", "text": "The second outcome aims to improve the national quality system and infrastructure, particularly with regard to standardisation, conformity assessment and certification. In order for Sierra Leonean companies to have access to regional and international markets, the action aims to support their compliance with the WTO rules, Everything but Arms (EBA) scheme, EU environmental standards, ECOWAS Trade Liberalisation Scheme and African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA). The improvement of the capacities and services of Sierra Leone Standard Bureau (SLSB), Produce Monitoring Board (PMB) and other relevant organisations involved in the inspection of exports and imports and compliance with international standards is necessary to overcome non-tariff barriers to trade."}, {"bbox": [96, 377, 1135, 564], "category": "Text", "text": "The third outcome will support the implementation of institutional reforms contributing to the creation of an enabling and predictable business environment. A clear commitment and willingness of national authorities will constitute a prerogative to supporting such reforms. They should, among others, promote clear and transparent rules for investors, respect and compliance with international contracts and agreements, reduction of red tape, predictable tax system, enhanced rule of law and fight against corruption. The public-private dialogue, especially between the EU businesses and the national authorities would be further enhanced. Close coordination and consultation will be maintained with the EU companies in Sierra Leone."}, {"bbox": [85, 604, 323, 636], "category": "Section-header", "text": "# 2 RATIONALE"}, {"bbox": [85, 670, 234, 697], "category": "Section-header", "text": "## 2.1 Context"}, {"bbox": [96, 743, 1135, 907], "category": "Text", "text": "Despite its vast mineral resources and fertile soil, Sierra Leone is facing major development challenges such as poor business environment and investment climate², high level of corruption³, insufficient economic diversification⁴, lack of entrepreneurial and agriculture skills, high level of public debt, low productivity of local companies, weak and import dependent industrial base⁵ and limited access to finances⁶, especially for women entrepreneurs. The ongoing war on Ukraine has exacerbated these structural weaknesses resulting in high annual inflation⁷, supply chain disruption and increase of poverty."}, {"bbox": [96, 933, 1135, 1066], "category": "Text", "text": "There is a broad consensus amongst policy makers, development partners and business representatives that it is necessary to undertake business environment reforms to support the integration of Sierra Leone to regional and international markets and to improve the competitiveness and productivity of local MSMEs. These actions should contribute to increase the resilience of the country to external shocks, create high value-added sustainable jobs and decrease country's reliance on imports."}, {"bbox": [96, 1092, 1135, 1302], "category": "Text", "text": "The entrepreneurial support ecosystem in Sierra Leone is nascent with a growing number of private, non-profit and public entities and programmes offering non-financial Business development services (BDS) to entrepreneurs and MSMEs, through training, coaching, mentoring, peer-support, advisory, advocacy and networking, in order to help them tackle persistent and emerging challenges. In the recent years, development partners such as the World Bank⁸ and UNDP⁹ have supported non-financial BDS providers, entrepreneurs, MSMEs and university's entrepreneurship/innovation spaces. Sierra Leone has a big diaspora abroad, especially in the UK and the US. Many of the innovative businesses as well as start-ups incubators and accelerators are run by Sierra Leoneans who have worked and studied abroad."}, {"bbox": [96, 1330, 1135, 1410], "category": "Text", "text": "The current Administration came to power in 2018 with the agenda to promote economic transformation and inclusive growth through investments in the human capital. Economic diversification and competitiveness of the economy have been among its main priorities. However, the challenges for doing business in the country have"}, {"bbox": [85, 1449, 711, 1472], "category": "Footnote", "text": "² Doing business indicators ranked Sierra Leone on 163rd place out of 190 countries"}, {"bbox": [85, 1471, 960, 1494], "category": "Footnote", "text": "³ Transparency International's 2021 Corruption Perception Index ranked Sierra Leone 115th out of 180 total countries"}, {"bbox": [85, 1494, 533, 1515], "category": "Footnote", "text": "⁴ Agriculture, forestry, and fishing represent 61.3% of GDP"}, {"bbox": [85, 1515, 603, 1536], "category": "Footnote", "text": "⁵ In 2021, the trade deficit was USD 616 million USD (14% of GDP)"}, {"bbox": [85, 1536, 1144, 1579], "category": "Footnote", "text": "⁶ In 2021, only 29% of the people have bank accounts and 6% borrowed any money from formal financial institution (World Bank, The Global Findex Database 2021)"}, {"bbox": [85, 1579, 792, 1603], "category": "Footnote", "text": "⁷ In March 2023, the annual inflation was 41.5% (to Bank of Sierra Leone - https://bsl.gov.sl/)"}, {"bbox": [85, 1602, 611, 1625], "category": "Footnote", "text": "⁸ Sierra Leone Economic Diversification Project - https://sledp.gov.sl/"}, {"bbox": [85, 1624, 926, 1646], "category": "Footnote", "text": "⁹ UNDP Sierra Leone Accelerator Lab - https://www.undp.org/acceleratorlabs/undp-sierra-leone-accelerator-lab"}, {"bbox": [1027, 1679, 1145, 1706], "category": "Page-footer", "text": "Page 4 of 24"}]