Business Landscape in Tanzania: Status and Hurdles with Evidence from Mbeya Region.

Abstract

This paper explores the business landscape in Tanzania, with a specific focus on Mbeya region, by addressing key questions related to business ownership, sources of information, business status, easiness of doing business, and hurdles facing businesses. The study adopted cross-sectional design to a sample of 322 business persons in Mbeya region. Descriptive statistics and graphs were employed as a methods of analysis. On the business landscape, results show that, business ownership is dominated by adults (79%) and males (49%) while youths and females constitute only 8% and 9% respectively. Information for business start-ups are mainly sourced from informal sources (61%). Information for business operations are mainly sourced from television (20%), social media and radio (15%) and government offices (12%) while experts role is minimal around 3 -7%. On the easiness of doing business, it takes on average 29 days to meet business regulations and procedures before starting. Start-up procedures and the cost of start-up procedures as a percentage of GNI per capita were 10 and 40.6 respectively. Other major challenges reported include high tax (24%), lack of capital (62%), regulations, procedures and permits (11%). Empowering youths and women, reducing bureaucracy-business regulations and procedures, fostering accountability among tax administrators and public business experts as well as providing grace period to business start-ups are vital aspects to improved business landscape in the region.