Welcoming the government’s relief package for the Micro, Small and Medium Enterprise (MSME) sector, Union Minister for MSMEs and Road Transport & Highways Nitin Gadkari has said it will re-energize the cash-strapped MSME sector. He said the turnover of the village industry has been around Rs 88,000 crore, which the government aspires to take forward to Rs 5 lakh crore in the next two years. He noted that the stimulus package will help achieve this target in a big way. He added that the khadi sector will play a big role in this as it is entering into exports also.
The minister was upbeat over the change of definition of the MSME sector. He said raising investment limit in this sector to Rs 100 crore will give great boost to the industry, which will now get easy finance from banks. He added that the sector was demanding this revision for long. He also stated that the Fund of Funds, which has a corpus of Rs 10,000 crore, will benefit over 25 lakh MSMEs under stress. Similarly, easing of global tendering norm is a remarkable step.
Gadkari expressed hope that now new orders will be received from Defence and Police for uniforms, etc. He said economic support to this sector which gives employment to over 11 crore people and contributes nearly 29 percent to the GDP, can never be forgotten by the stakeholders of this sector. He also expressed confidence that the MSME, village, and cottage industry sector will grow to new heights with the support of this package.