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CHALLENGES IN SMALL SCALE ENTREPRENEURSHIP DEVELOPMENT IN THE HOSPITALITY INDUSTRY

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1   Background of the Study

The contribution of small –scale business in fostering economic growth and development has been well articulated in different areas of this study .the specific attention on them based on their expected impact and potential contribution on broad and diversified production base, as well as their accelerative effect in achieving macro objectives pertaining to full employment, income distribution and the development of local technology. They are particularly most conducive for diffusion of management skills and emulation of indigenous entrepreneurship overtime. Small business provides financial opportunity and a chance to develop wealth. It is a place where creative, motivated individuals can use their talents and expertise to the fullest, because it provides satisfying careers and job opportunities and it’s also the back bone of the market economy of the word. Every big business starts as a small business, and it started with an entrepreneur (small business), who at first, earns little or no profit. It was the new ideas of small business that brought about Luxury City Royale, Hotel De La Paix etc. and even the many commercial banks in Nigeria. Untried ideas become annulations that become concepts that changed the business world. And so it goes. Small business is the basis for the economic well-being many developed nations including USA/Japan. Entrepreneurship is what makes a small business successful. Entrepreneurship occurs when an individual develops a new venture, a new approach to an old business or idea, or a unique way of giving the market place a product or service by using resources in a new way under conditions of risk. Small business triumphs and entrepreneurship are closely related to it. It is difficult to separate them. The unemployment situation in the country coupled with the new government instinctive towards easing social tensions among unemployed youths, through the programmed of the National Directorate of Employment (NDE), were intended to lure a lot of unemployed Nigerians, including graduates into self-determination through self-employment. Graduates and school leavers are now realizing that government and the established private companies are not ready to come to their aid directly, through paid employment due to the dividing state of the economy. Short of the alternatives, Nigerians including our graduates are therefore launching themselves into various small-scale business ventures, such as cottage soap and cosmetics production, fairing, restaurants, fast food, publishing, writing, block making, garri processing, food processing, refuse disposal, taxi driving, cleaning services, weaving, baking tailoring, advertising and other same business venture which depends mostly on local raw materials. The determination to succeed is also fast becoming the order of the day. Government has been playing appreciative role in promoting the survival and growth of small-scale enterprise in recognition of them flexible and adaptive nature as well as their re-generative power in promoting economic growth and development. Government also encourages people to establish their own small business so as to reduce the problem of unemployment in the country and also reduce the problem of importation of goods, more so, to produce exportation products. Government in believing that a dynamic and growing small manufacturing sub-sector can contribute significantly to the implementation of a wide range development effectives, has thus enunciated various policies to encourage their proliferation and make them veritable engines of growth and development. In the third and for the development plans and the on-going three years rolling plan, priority has been accorded industrialization with greater emphasis on small-scale enterprises. The basic activities of government policies as maintained in the monetary and fiscal policy measures, are to improve the financing and other supportive services of small-scale business by expanding and improving access to credit and infrastructural facilities, reducing their production costs, boosting their profitability, enhancing their survival and growth capacities as well as expanding their contributions to non-oil exports by making their products competitive in the export markets. Hardly could any major industry succeed without the services of small business enterprise. The major goals of any profit oriented business are to make profit. A company will make more profit if statistics its customers need better them the competitors. Therefore in the contribution of small-scale business, hospitality industry would produce what the customers want and by so doing they maximize profit and only hospitality industry that are effective and efficient can satisfy customer’s needs. In reality, it is possible to run a business without profit for a time, but it is not possible for a business to survive for one day without customers. Customers are the central theme of any business. Without a total commitment to them, contribution to economic growth and development will have limited and brief effects. The hospitality industry is a broad category of fields within the service industry that includes lodging, event planning, theme parks, transportation, cruise line, and additional fields within the tourism industry. The hospitality industry is a multibillion-dollar industry that depends on the availability of leisure time and disposable income. A hospitality unit such as a restaurant, hotel, or an amusement park consists of multiple groups such as facility maintenance and direct operations (servers, housekeepers, porters, kitchen workers, bartenders, management, marketing, and human resources etc.). Usage rate, or its inverse "vacancy rate", is an important variable for the hospitality industry. Just as a factory owner would wish a productive asset to be in use as much as possible (as opposed to having to pay fixed costs while the factory is not producing), so do restaurants, hotels, and theme parks seek to maximize the number of customers they "process" in all sectors. This led to formation of services with the aim to increase usage rate provided by hotel consolidators. Information about required or offered products is brokered on business networks used by vendors as well as purchasers. In looking at various industries, "barriers to entry" by newcomers and competitive advantages between current players are very important. Among other things, hospitality industry players find advantage in old classics (location), initial and on-going investment support (reflected in the material upkeep of facilities and the luxuries located therein), and particular themes adopted by the marketing arm of the organization in question (for example at theme restaurants). Also very important are the characteristics of the personnel working in direct contact with the customers. The authenticity, professionalism, and actual concern for the happiness and well-being of the customers that is communicated by successful organizations are a clear competitive advantage.