Staff Reporter | 19 Aug, 2008
Indian small and medium enterprises will soon access international know-how with the country’s top technology and management institutes joining hands with the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) and a foreign management consultant to introduce a three-year training programme.

The Visionary SME Programme set for a September-end launch would have contribution from experts at the Indian Institute of Management, Calcutta and the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras along with Shobishiba, a Japanese management consultant.

The programme would start with 15 firms initially and the volume of participation would grow later depending on the success of the maiden run.

"Our aim is to help Indian SMEs understand why they trail the best SMEs in the world, and what they could do to achieve the same standards," said Ramesh Datla, chairman, CII MSME (micro, small and medium enterprises) Council.

CII is going to create model small & medium enterprise (SME) of global standards by selecting 10-15 SMEs from different sectors in association with IIM-Calcutta, IIT-Chennai and a Japanese consultant, Shobi Shiba.

"This is going to be a three-year programme, starting this September-end. The institutes would provide the SMEs training in various technological and industrial aspects," Datla said.

"Gradually, all the SMEs would be upgraded to global standards, but to begin with, we would pick up 15," he said.

"We have also approached the finance and MSME ministry regarding simplifying the foreign exchange Act for easier participation of FDI (foreign direct investment) in the SME sector," Datla told reporters.

In an effort to upgrade the SME sector, CII is launching an SME portal in the next three months as a one-stop shop for information on the sector. The portal will also include information on policy and marketing issues, said Datla.

The Securities & Exchange Board of India (Sebi) is also planning to float an SME exchange programme by the end of 2008, said MS Ray, executive director, Sebi. The corporate governance norms for the programme would be very stringent, he said.

GD Gautama, principal secretary, department of micro, small & medium enterprises and textiles, government of West Bengal, while talking about government and private initiatives to stimulate the growth of the MSME sector, said major hurdles faced by the enterprises are finance, technology, infrastructure and marketing.

SBI disburses Rs 76,329 crore loans: The State Bank of India disbursed Rs 76,329 crore loans to the SME sector in 2007-08, an increase of 30% compared with Rs 58,674 crore loans lent in 2006-07. "The target this fiscal is 30% more than last year," said Jayanta K Sinha, CGM of SBI.