The productivity performance of Australian manufacturing SMEs

Full text for this resource is not available from the Research Repository.

Mahmood, Muhammad (2004) The productivity performance of Australian manufacturing SMEs. Journal of new business ideas and trends, 2 (1). pp. 21-28. ISSN 1446-8719

Abstract

In an open economy like Australia, SMEs ability to export has become very crucial for their long-term servival and growth. This depends on SMEs capacity to remain internationally competitive. Productivity growth is the key which will enable SMEs to deliver products at lower costs. The results indicate that there are large differences in productivity between SMEs and large enterprises but there also exist significant differences in productivity levels across industries in the manufacturing sector. However productivity increased at a faster rate for SMEs than that for large enterprises in the period from 1994-95 to 1999-2000. Despite the faster growth rate achieved by SMEs in productivity, in most of the industries average productivity still remains much lower than that for large enterprises. At the aggregate manufacturing sector level, average productivity stands at half of that achieved by large enterprises. In this context, government policy initiatives need to be directed towards addressing the issues relating to market and institutional rigidities.

Item type Article
URI https://vuir.vu.edu.au/id/eprint/1275
Official URL http://www.jnbit.org/upload/Mahmood-2-1-2004.pdf
Subjects Historical > RFCD Classification > 340000 Economics
Historical > Faculty/School/Research Centre/Department > School of Economics and Finance
Keywords economic, Australia, small and medium enterprises (SMEs), productivity levels, industry, export
Download/View statistics View download statistics for this item

Search Google Scholar

Repository staff login