This study evaluated the impact of small and medium enterprises development on economic growth in Nigeria. The study used aggregate asset base and aggregate capitalization of SMEs as the independent variables, while gross domestic product (proxy for economic growth) was adopted as the dependent variable. Secondary time series data were collected from the Central Bank of Nigeria Statistical Bulletin 2018, National Bureau of Statistics 2018, and National Survey of Micro Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) 2013 & 2017 conducted by the Small & Medium Enterprise Development Agency of Nigeria (SMEDAN) for the period 2000 to 2018. Descriptive statistics and multiple regression analysis based on the OLS technique (with the aid of SPSS version 19) were employed as methods for data analysis. The findings show that the aggregate asset base and aggregate capitalization of SMEs have little or no significant effect on the GDP. It was also discovered that there exists a long-run relationship among the variables even though the overall regression model was not statistically significant at 5%. It was recommended amongst others that more efforts should be put in place by Government to gather enough information on SMEs through the responsible. The Federal and /State Ministries of Industry in collaboration with SMEDAN should work out strategies for reporting the operations of SMEs in Nigeria, highlighting the asset base and aggregate capitalization of the sector and put in places policies to resuscitate the sector.
Keywords: Capitalization, Small and Medium Enterprises, asset base, economic growth
