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The Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) contribute about 40 percent towards country's Gross Domestic Products (GDP). The diverse activities of the SMEs sector can be gauged from the fact that about 80 percent of the labour force are absorbed in this sector.
About 96 percent enterprises are in SMEs as compare to 4 percent associated with mega projects.
SMEs contribute about 50 percent trading; 35 percent services; and 15 percent manufacturing of the overall economy, but only 14 percent SMEs are able to get banking/leasing loan facilities.
To address various issues concerning the SMEs sector, the Publicity Channel in collaboration with the Small and Medium Enterprises Association (Samea), Small & Medium Enterprise Development Authority (Smeda) and other stakeholders is organising a two-day conference and an exhibition on SMEs in Pakistan from September 28 to 29 at Karachi.
The event has been named as 'SME-CONEX' which stands for "Small & Medium Enterprise Conference & Exhibition."
This was stated by Samea president Zafar Iqbal, Kati chairman Mian Zahid Hussain, Publicity Channel CEO M. Naeem Qureshi and Pakistan Pharmaceutical Manufacturers Association research committee chairman Kaiser Waheed at a press conference here on Tuesday. Representative of Smeda Ijaz Majeed, Tariq Khan Baloch from SME Bank and Shaikh Talib Fatah from JICA were also present on the occasion.
The Governor of State Bank of Pakistan (SBP), Commerce Minister and representatives of chambers of commerce and industry of Karachi, Lahore, Rawalpindi, Sialkot, etc, would be invited to chair various sessions of the conference and to inaugurate the exhibition. The conference would address important issues relating to the SMEs sector in Pakistan and a parallel activity of the exhibition would give a "seeing is believing" impression of the progress made in this sector in the country.
It has an established fact that the SMEs play a vital role in the socio-economic growth of a country.
The SMEs have the largest employment potential; they provide main support potential for heavy industries at upstream and downstream ends. They are the largest producers of consumer goods and services and the largest tax-paying sector in any country.
In Pakistan, although the government with its meagre resources is paying attention to the SMEs, the amount of interest and encouragement of this sector actually deserves is still lacking.
The sector is confronted with issues like lack of infrastructural support, lack of R&D activities, financing facilities, legal policies, protection and facilitation, etc.
The situation in SME sector is such that the questions like should it be capital outlay base, should it be turnover base, should it be product base or should it be something else are still unresolved.
While local experts in entrepreneurial skills, financial management, academia, R&D institutions, government industries, commerce & trade related organisations and the bodies will share their experiences during the conference, the organisers are also focusing on induction of speakers to speak on similar scenario in countries like Japan, UK, Switzerland, Germany, Hong Kong, etc.
The topics likely to come up for discussions during various sessions spread over two days will include issues and difficulties relating to infrastructural support, funding, investment & technical advisory services, taxation & tariff, stability in political decisions, law and order situations, utility services, investment climate, geo-political factors, etc.
During the conference, positively concrete proposals and recommendations would be framed up for submission to the government, entrepreneurs, development financing institutions, R&D organisations, trade bodies and genuine associations and other related organisations.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2004

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