§ Mr. CotterTo ask the President of the Board of Trade what is the current participation level of small medium-sized enterprises in the Foresight Programme. [52910]
§ Mrs. RochePeople with a small business background sit on a number of Foresight panels. SMEs are also active participants in projects giving effect to Foresight priorities, eg SMEs account for over half the companies participating in the nineteen new LINK programmes launched since 1995 in response to Foresight.
There is a need, however, to make outputs from Foresight more accessible to SMEs. A number of initiatives have been taken for this purpose, most recently the development and publication earlier this month of Future Markets—Future Business, a guide for business intermediaries designed to enable SMEs to benefit from Foresight, which has been widely piloted among SMEs. A number of Foresight panels are also working closely with trade associations in tailoring the results of Foresight to SMEs.