Under the 11th Plan, the Government is proposing to increase the financial assistance to existing clusters of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises upto 80% of their financial requirements. This was revealed by Dr. Chandrapal, Secretary, Ministry of Small Scale Industries & Rural and Agro Industries at the SME Cluster Conclave organized by Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), in partnership with the Ministry of Small Scale Industries. “80% of the financial requirements of the existing clusters will be given by the government under the Micro Small Enterprises- Cluster Development Programme proposed under the 11th Plan. This assistance will be provided towards aspects such as technology upgradation and meeting the financial gaps” said Dr. Chandrapal.

While congratulating CII on organizing the Conclave, Dr. Chandrapal urged them to help the government in identifying the clusters that would be eligible for the proposed financial assistance as well as bring out schemes for skill development, where CII could play a critical role. “The government departments can come up with Schemes but it is CII who can play the role of a catalyst to build skills” he said.

“To enable MSMEs to become competitive, the government is proposing to build a pool of consultants under its National Manufacturing Competitiveness Programme. These consultants would be deployed with a cluster of 8-10 companies for a period of one to one and a half years. The cost of these consultants will be borne by the government”, added Mr. Jawahar Sircar, Additional Secretary & Development Commissioner, Ministry (SSI) of SSI &ARI.

The Cluster Conclave also hosted a Kaizen exhibition where close to 200 Kaizens from over 40 MSMEs were displayed. The results of the Annual Kaizen Competition of CII were also announced at the Conclave.

Speaking at the Conclave, Mr. Jamil Ashraf, Executive Director, Sandhar technologies said that while it was easy to build partnerships it was a difficult task to sustain them, which the cluster approach helps to build

Mr. H.P.Kumar, Chairman & Managing Director, NSIC, while appraising the delegates of the various NSIC schemes said “In order to assist the MSMEs the government is in the process of notifying a set of rules under Public Procurement Provisions”.

Mr. Rakesh Rewari, Deputy Managing Director, SIDBI said “Banks are facing a big challenge in terms of being able to reach a wider segment of the SMEs while keeping the transaction costs low, getting the delivery model right and helping to get better technology. Another area of focus would be to get microcredit off the ground.”

Mr. S. Sandilya, Chairman, CII Economic Affairs Committee & Chairman Eicher Group, said that while this was the first SME Cluster Conclave organized by CII in collaboration with the government, the plan is to organize many more such events in partnership with the government and spread the message.

While speaking at the Conclave, Mr. Jawahar Sircar, Additional Secretary & Development Commissioner, Ministry (SSI) of SSI &ARI said that the Cluster Concept was India’s answer to global competition. While other countries have the resources to build mile long factories, we bring together our resources in the form of clusters to create large organizations to compete globally.

Source: machinist.in