MUSCAT: Haya Water pays great attention to supporting the Small and Medium Enterprises (SME’s) by giving them a large share of the company’s projects. This is part of the Company’s national responsibility and its economical role to support this important segment.
Hussain bin Hassan AbdulHussain, Haya Water CEO, says: “The SMEs play an important role in developing the Sultanate’s economy through providing Omani youth with many job opportunities. The Company’s support comes in allocating and attributing a portion of tenders and projects to the SMEs.”
He added that these initiatives have resulted in Haya Water winning the award for the SMEs best sponsor among major governmental companies in 2015.
AbdulHussain added that the 2017 Haya Water statistics indicated that the SMEs were awarded more than RO 1 million in terms of closed tenders. However, in the open tenders, the company has awarded more than half a million Rial Omani for the SMEs.
As for the tenders in which large size companies are committed to granting SMEs 10 per cent of the value of the tenders, they amounted to approximately RO 1.5 million. The amount exceeded the specified percentage.
Haya Water CEO said: “In terms of training, Haya Water works continuously to execute many training workshops for the SMEs owners who are registered with Haya Water. The training programmes aim to refine their skills on the fundamentals of business and how to raise the level of public performance.
“The training also covers methods of bidding and sound financial management that ensure achieving good profits. Besides, there are technical workshops that are also being held to prepare the SME owners to work in the waste water sector”.
“The company provided eight training courses and five courses in 2016, 2017 respectively. As a result, 69 SMEs owners benefited from those programmes. These courses are offered at no cost, based on the Company’s strategy to support the community.
Contracts and Tenders Section examine tenders and ensure that SMEs got their shares prior to announcing them in the market.
Hussain confirmed that the SMEs were exempted from registration fees in the company’s procurement and bidding system. Tenders fees for these companies were also eliminated in order to facilitate the procedures and provide necessary support to them.
The CEO also confirmed that Haya Water has developed certain objectives to support and develop small and medium enterprises.
As about 22 per cent, 25 per cent, 21 per cent, 25 per cent and 28 per cent of purchases and services were allocated for SMEs for the years 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, and 2017 respectively.
In addition, 274 small and medium enterprises were registered with Haya Water during the five years mentioned above.
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