Human Capital Development and Exporting Potential of SMES in Nigeria

Abstract

More and more Small and Medium scale Enterprises (SMEs) in Nigeria are failing before they enter into their second year of operation and those that continue to operate are not seizing the opportunities of taking their businesses to the global market. Though they have the desires and zeal to be enterprising, lack of adequate human capital development through training and skill acquisition continue to be a high priority bottleneck that delimits the exporting potentials of SMEs in Nigeria. This study looked into the level of education of SMEs operators in Nigeria and their performance at the international market. It investigated the correlation and effect of education on the exporting potential of SMEs in Nigeria. Education was discovered to play a vital part in the exporting potential of SMEs as it had a high significant effect on both export (at P value of 0.001) and export sales of SMEs (at P value of 0.000).