Small enterprises under taxation pressure

Small entrepreneurship is nearly disappearing from Georgia’s economic map, according to the Association for Small Entrepreneurs, which also suggests it appears as if the state is deliberately conducting a fight against small entrepreneurship. Back in 2001 the then finance minister Zurab Noghaideli abolished the law on small entrepreneurship and until today there has been no special legislation to protect the rights of small entrepreneurs. The head of the association, Anzor Sakandelidze says that the benefits highlighted in the current taxation code are mystifying. Small businessmen with an annual turnover of not exceeding 30 000 GEL are not subject to tax, provided they have no employees. He says this is absurd since in any normal country hiring extra people, giving them job and a wage is promoted and supported by the state. Sakandelidze also criticises the new taxation code in which small businesses are defined as those with an annual turnover of less than GEL100,000, whereas, he claims the EU recommends small businesses are those with an annual turnover of Euro 10 million.