Vijayawada: FAPCCI webinar stresses on support to MSME sector

Vijayawada: In spite of many initiatives of the Central Government, the MSME sector still needs support, said Former Deputy Governor of Reserve Bank of India R Gandhi on Tuesday.

Addressing a webinar on 'Sustaining Growth of MSME Sector' organised by the Federation of Andhra Pradesh Chamber of Commerce and Industry (FAPCCI), he opined that the formal banking system is unable to support the requirement of documents by MSMEs. He recalled that the recent launch of the Account Aggregator network in India bringing open banking and empowering millions of customers to digitally access and share their financial data across institutions in a secure and efficient manner. He further added that the Account Aggregator avoids many hassles involved in the present financial system.

Consulting editor of the Business Standard Subhomoy Bhattacharjee moderated the proceedings.

Additional Director General of Foreign Trade in the Union Ministry of Commerce Ajay Srivastava emphasised the need to simplify the procedures for MSMEs especially on the export front. Easy access to finance, lower customs duty on raw materials would be the need of the hour. "We need to develop a national trade platform to support MSMEs especially in the logistics and trade finance sectors."

M1Exchange CEO Sundeep Mohindru spoke about the Trade Receivable Discounting System (TReDS) set up in order to facilitate the discounting trade receivables of MSMEs from corporate buyers through invoice discounting. He said M1Exchange is one of the implementing agencies of the system that made Rs16,500 crore business. He also added that registration of change on CERSAI portal can now be done by TReDS platforms on behalf of the financiers.

Deputy General Manager of SBI Amravati Circle K Ranga Rajan stressed the need to reduce the cost of credit and insurance on credit guarantee if MSMEs needs to be developed. He said that the loans without collateral need to be intensified and it is the need of the hour.