Small and Medium Enterprises Development Authority (Smeda) has initiated the process to prepare a new SME development strategy focusing on creation of fresh employments and investment opportunities. Chief Executive Officer Smeda, Sardar Ahmad Nawaz Sukhera stated this while talking to the World Bank mission here at Smeda head office on Wednesday.
The mission was comprised Kiran Afzal, Private Sector Development Specialist for South Asia and Sohail Moghal, Consultant of the World Bank. Smeda CEO said that continuing with a number of in-house brain storming sessions, a move for consultation with stakeholders of SME sector would be launched next week.
He said entrepreneurs, SME experts and academics as well as the SME trade bodies are being approached to have their suggestions on making Smeda's role more effective in development of SME sector, adding that Smeda would be repositioned in light of the opinion, suggestions and inputs received from the stakeholders. The World Bank mission was apprised about existing set up and operational mechanism of Smeda, which is constrained to both financial as well as capacity limitations.
He was confident that the organisation would be made effective, active and pro-active by equipping it with the better infrastructure. For that, he said, Smeda would have to prove it a worthwhile organisation by producing a viable business plan targeted to create optimal number of new employments. He informed that Smeda's sector development team had been entrusted with the task to pickup six potential sectors each from Punjab, Sindh, Balochistan, KP, Gilgit Baltistan and AJK with the aim of generating new jobs. He hoped that Smeda would be able to complete its new SME development plan comprising 42 labour-intensive and export oriented sectors before coming election.
Earlier, the World Bank mission appreciated Smeda's role in implementing the project titled as "Economic Revitalisation of KP and FATA" (ERKF) financed by the World Bank under a Multi Donor Trust Fund (MDTF). The mission representatives said that the high credibility of Smeda had led this partnership to Competitive Industries Project.
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