Facebook Giving $4.75 Million in Grants to Small Businesses in S’pore

As time goes by, it’s becoming more and more apparent that Facebook is more than just an American social media conglomerate corporation.

I mean; just look at what it has done over the course of its ‘career’.

During a time when just about every expert predicted its imminent demise, Facebook silenced all the loud-mouthed critics by buying over its chief competitors.

As majority of businesses falter in the current situation, Facebook somehow still finds itself operating on a relatively stable basis.

And now, it seems that it’s going one step further.

Apparently, Facebook is set to start helping small businesses around the world.

Yeah, I know.

If Facebook improves any further…

It’s probably gonna start creating zombie viruses or something.

Facebook Giving $4.75 Million in Grants to Small Businesses in S’pore

According to Channel News Asia, social media company Facebook will be providing around S$4.75 million in grants to small businesses in Singapore that have been affected by the Covid-19 pandemic.

Around 800 local enterprises, that hire between two and 50 people, are expected to be eligible for the grants.

Apparently, each grant will entail a sum of S$5,500 each, with S$3,500 coming in cash and S$2,000 in optional ad credits.

Applications for the grants are open from now until 22 September.

To qualify, firms must have been in business for more than a year, and “experienced challenges due to the pandemic”.

They are not required to have a presence on Facebook to apply.

Meanwhile, Facebook will also be helping up to 30,000 businesses in more than 30 countries where the social media company operates.

According to its website, these businesses will be able to receive around US$100 million in grants.

Cash Flow Problems

Facebook’s announcement would certainly come as a pleasant surprise to particular local enterprises.

According to the State of Small Business Report, which is an ongoing study by the World Bank, OECD and Facebook (damn it’s even doing studies now), nearly 58 per cent of small- and medium-sized businesses surveyed in Singapore have expressed concerns over cash flow in recent months.

According to data from the Department of Statistics (SingStat), retail sales in Singapore purportedly fell 8.5 per cent year-on-year in July.

As such, small businesses have reportedly made serious efforts to enter the digital market.

62 per cent of small- and medium-sized businesses in Singapore operating on Facebook, for instance, stated that 25 per cent or more of their sales were earned digitally in the past month.

You can apply here if you want to.

Facebook Shops And Instagram Shopping

Facebook has also added a plethora of methods through which small businesses can promote their products online, such as Facebook Shops and Instagram Shopping.

The company stated that it pulled together these resources in a bid to support small businesses and to help the economy emerge stronger from the crisis as a collective whole.

“Small businesses are the heart of our communities and the backbone of our economy. They have also been some of the hardest hit by COVID-19, impacting lives and livelihoods for so many Singaporeans – and it is more important than ever for us to move forward together through these challenging times,” said Facebook Singapore country director Damian Kim.

“We’ve pulled together these resources to support small businesses here, as we look to play our part in supporting economic recovery and work to emerge stronger from the pandemic.”

Not Exactly The First Time Either

Over the years, Facebook has proven numerous times that it’s more than just a face, book and Mark Zuckerberg.

Back in 2011, Facebook teamed up with the U.S. Department of Labor to help unemployed Americans find work via social networks.

The effort was called the “Social Jobs Partnership”.

And in 2014 alone, the world’s largest social network was reported to have stimulated $227 billion in economic impact and generated 4.5 million jobs around the world.

That’s a staggering figure considering how Facebook is, at the very base, just one out of millions of phone apps.

Help Rendered At The Right Time

As more and more businesses begin to bite the bullet in light of the current circumstances, Facebook’s show of support for small businesses will certainly serve to assist in one way or another.

And though the amount may admittedly not be much, considering how it’s on a company basis and not an individual basis, it will still prove a great help in preserving certain companies’ operations.

But even still, we’re not letting Facebook off the hook.

At the rate things are going, I won’t be surprised if it starts contesting for global supremacy as an individual entity.

Though if it continues to prove positive in such vein, I don’t think we have any reason to get in its way.

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