【正文】 attributed to two factors. The first is that the majority of micro enterprises are established with startup capital from personal savings or contributions from friends and family members and since such retail businesses do not require a lot of capital, it not surprising that they are the majority. Employment by Micro Enterprises The number of employees of a business is one of the factors used to classify micro, small and medium enterprises. Although no standard definition specifies a minimum or maximum number of employees for these categories, micro enterprises are on the lower end of the scale regarding capacity to employ. The data show that the majority of microenterprises in Uganda employ between one and five persons, indicating that the businesses are largely a source of selfemployment rather than of large scale job creation. They are also the largest source of nonagricultural self employment. This means that with the increasing adverse effects of climate change on agriculture, increasing population pressure on land and swelling ruralurban migration, micro enterprises of this nature will continue to rise. The result is an expanding informal sector that has no capacity to create jobs, contribute to the national economy and transform economically. Size is another indicator used to classify businesses as micro, small, medium and large scale enterprises. However, like the employment variable, size is not consistently defined. In the European Union, business enterprises that have assets not exceeding two million Euros are classified as micro enterprises, while those with assets not exceeding ten million Euros are small enterprises, and a medium enterprise has assets not exceeding 34 million The data show that the majority of micro enterprises in Uganda have assets not exceeding Ugshs. 5 million ($2,500). This finding is indicative of the manner in which these businesses are set up — as small, informally established, sole proprietorship businesses initially financed with little startup capital, usually from informal sources. Because most micro enterprises neither keep financial records nor are audited, respondents were simply asked to estimate the value of their businesses as a going concern. There were slightly more micro enterprises owned by men than by women. This trend was the same in the different regions of the country. Only 68 micro enterprises were jointly owned, and, in most cases, the coowners were either spouses or siblings. The low level of joint enterprise is not only typical of micro enterprises but also of other forms of business enterprises as well. This is may be due to i nadequate legal protection for shareholders. The current Companies Act was enacted in 1948 and is out of date with current corporate governance standards. The majority of micro enterprise owners do not own any substantial assets that can be used as collateral for a loan. A few were able to obtain credit from microfinance institutions that provide credit using collateral substitutes such as group loans, forced savings and small contingent loans. However, for other reasons discussed below, access to micro credit remains a challenge for micro enterprises. Other Determinants of Financing Decisions of Micro Enterprises in Uganda Apart from the path dependence factors discussed above, there are other several factors influence the financing decisions of micro enterprises, including the choice of using formal or informal credit, borrowing from microfinance lenders or mercial banks, and accessing credit individually or through group lending. The latter decision, for example, may be influenced by the credit history of the borrower and the availability of collateral. If a business has neither a prior relationship with a financial institution nor substantial collateral, it may find obtaining credit difficult and instead do so through group lending. Although micro enterprises are easy to establish and usually obtain startup capital from personal resources, access to formal credit is critical for subsequent growth. Below, I discuss the findings on various factors that influence the financing decisions of micro enterprises. Access to Formal Credit Out of the 602 micro enterprises surveyed, only 34% stated that they had applied for a loan, while the majority (64%) had never done so. An analysis of the respondents by business location did not reveal any regional advantages in access to formal credit. In Kampala, only 31% had applied for a loan。這種定義的特點在整個烏干達(dá)都是類似的，他們對經(jīng)濟的貢獻(xiàn)主要限于非農(nóng)業(yè)非正規(guī)部門自我就業(yè)上。然而，對于那些貸款需求不是那么急切比如計劃購買設(shè)備像冰箱或者股票來改善微企經(jīng)營的微企來說，他們還是寧肯向正規(guī)點兒的金融機構(gòu) 申請信貸 而不是 申請 非正規(guī) 信貸。這就包括培養(yǎng)預(yù)期貸款申請、組團過程和 初期 儲蓄的積累等。調(diào)查發(fā)現(xiàn)有這么幾個優(yōu)勢比如快捷或者 十分簡單的信貸程序，重組償還的情況下一個依賴貸款的人將會體會到其困難。 然而，供應(yīng)商信貸有著一定的限制和其固定的圈子，其他供應(yīng)商則需要尋找另外的正規(guī)或者非正規(guī)信貸來源。這種現(xiàn)象大幅地減少了做生意的成本并且可以解釋為什么微企能夠以少量的資本作為啟動資金。農(nóng)產(chǎn)品生產(chǎn)商或者那些將農(nóng)產(chǎn)品從鄉(xiāng)村地區(qū)運送到城市地區(qū)販賣的中間人往往以農(nóng)產(chǎn)品本身為抵押來 獲取信貸并且在農(nóng)產(chǎn)品出售后償還貸款。 另外一些理由就是銀行收取貸款利息是被宗教所禁止的，“貸款貸走了好運”、“銀行在你向他們貸款的時候偷走了你的財產(chǎn)”和“我將我所有的利潤都再投入我的生意中因此我不需要貸款”。然而，區(qū)分使用信貸和需要信貸是非常重要的。這清晰地表明盡管當(dāng)局在信貸渠道改進(jìn)上面做出了更多的努力，尤其是在小額信貸方面，非正式信貸比正式信貸扮演著更加重要的角色。 這些受訪微企同樣被問到是否預(yù)先知曉一些關(guān)于獲取信貸的信息，他們說他們對信貸成本掌握了足夠的信息也非常清楚違約所可能造成的后果。這是銀行關(guān)系的一個不利之處。因此，重復(fù)性借款是圍繞資金活動的一個指標(biāo)。另外，就算是那些能夠從商業(yè)銀行處獲取貸款的大多數(shù)微企，與整個調(diào)查總體（ 602 家）相比 ，能夠獲取貸款的微企數(shù)遠(yuǎn)遠(yuǎn)小于那些不能夠成功獲取貸款的微企。這種現(xiàn)象可以用微企的自然屬性來解釋。 在聲稱申請過信貸的微企中， 86%的人成功地申請并獲得了信貸，同時有24%的人因為下面某些原因申請被拒絕了。然而，這種 趨勢并沒有反映在此次調(diào)查之中。一項調(diào)查顯示不同地域的受訪者在獲取正規(guī)信貸的渠道上并不存在所謂的地域性 差異 優(yōu)勢。如果一個微企主之前既沒有與金融機構(gòu)建立良好的合作關(guān)系也沒有大量的抵押品可用，那么他就可能發(fā)現(xiàn)獲取 個人 信貸是有多么的困難 并有可能采取組團信貸的方式。然而，由于以下涉及的一些原因，獲取小額信貸對于小微企業(yè)來說任然是一個不小的挑戰(zhàn)。這也許是缺乏足夠的法律措施來保護股東的利益。 上圖中我們可以明顯看出男性擁有的微企比女性擁有的微企 數(shù)量 要多。這些數(shù)據(jù)告訴我們?yōu)醺蛇_(dá)的大多數(shù)微型企業(yè)所擁有的資產(chǎn)不超過 Ugshs。 由于沒有足夠的資本來創(chuàng)造就業(yè)機會小微企業(yè)這種膨脹式發(fā)展無疑將會對國家經(jīng)濟和經(jīng)濟轉(zhuǎn)型造成各種影響。盡管沒有明確的標(biāo)準(zhǔn)來界定一個企業(yè)所擁有的員工最小或者最大數(shù)，小微企業(yè) 由于資本規(guī)模的限制往往擁有較少的員工數(shù)。其他一些受訪者從事一些包括農(nóng)業(yè)在內(nèi)的商業(yè)活動（養(yǎng)蜂，牛奶生產(chǎn) ）處理（蜂蜜，中藥材），一些小規(guī)模生產(chǎn)（木材和家具），和服務(wù)行業(yè)（理發(fā)，飯店里賣小食品和飲料）然而，這些受訪者數(shù)量上還不足以與