End-of-year export grants bigger than expected
Exporters who were approved for Export Market Development Grants (EMDG) in excess of $50,000 will now receive 73.94 cents in the dollar for that part of their entitlement above $50,000.
These businesses, which represent 30 per cent of all EMDG applicants, will receive their payments next week.
Previous forecasts had indicated that due to an unexpectedly high number of applications for the 2008-09 grant year, companies could only expect to be paid between 50 to 70 cents in the dollar.
The remaining 70 per cent of eligible applicants, who qualified for grants of $50,000 or less, have already received the full amount of their grant payments.
Austrade administers the EMDG scheme, which assists export-focused small and medium sized Australian businesses to become sustainable exporters by providing partial reimbursement of certain export promotion expenses.
The scheme reimburses up to 50 per cent of expenses incurred on eligible export promotion activities, above a $10,000 threshold.
Applications for the 2009-10 EMDG scheme will open 1 July, 2010.
