Women-led MSMEs in Vizag can explore biz of Rs 100 cr from PSUs

Due to lack of awareness, women-owned enterprises based in Visakhapatnam, the largest industrial city in Andhra Pradesh, have the potential to get a business of around Rs 100 crore per annum. Unfortunately they are able to avail only 10 to 20 per cent of the potential business - CII Vizag zone chairman Rajesh Grandhi, tells Bizz Buzz

♦ Govt has set 25% procurement target from MSMEs, including 3% from women-owned enterprises

♦ 14% of Indian entrepreneurs are women, but only 1% meet govt procurement targets

Visakhapatnam: In a novel initiative, the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) on Friday held an interactive session for women entrepreneurs with representatives from the public sector undertakings on how to market their products and services.

The initiative assumes importance in the backdrop of Government of India under the Public Procurement Policy mandating procurement of 25 per cent of their requirement through Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs), with a specific three per cent target set aside for women-owned enterprises (WOBs).

“WoBs based in Visakhapatnam, the largest industrial city in Andhra Pradesh, have the potential to get a business of around Rs 100 crore per annum. Unfortunately they are able to avail only 10 to 20 per cent of the potential business,” CII Vizag zone chairman Rajesh Grandhi told Bizz Buzz on the sidelines of the event. He said the State’s total potential will be much more.

Public procurement represents a huge opportunity to build a more inclusive economy, increase the participation of women-led businesses, and promote gender equality. However, the said target remains largely unmet, with the national average hovering around just one per cent.

Though women constitute 14 per cent of entrepreneurs in the country, equating to 8.05 million overseeing 20 per cent of MSMEs among 58.5 million enterprises, due to lack of awareness the target set for procurement is not being met. As women-led businesses tend to hire more women, supporting them creates a multiplier effect that extends beyond the business into the wider community, the CII meeting felt. Representatives from NTPC, HPCL, RINL and other PSUs explained how they prefer to source their requirements from women-led MSMEs.

Rajesh said in future they will organise more networking sessions following overwhelming response from women entrepreneurs to the vendor development programme under the PSU connect initiative.

Speaking at the meeting, Minister for Home and Disaster Management Vangalapudi Anitha said the TDP-led NDA government is committed to women empowerment and assured that she will always support the MSME entrepreneurs to sort if they face any obstacles in pursuing their business ventures.

During the question and answer session, Usha Raju, owner of Avani Organics narrated how she faced hardship in getting a loan for her business venture from a bank as her company did not have a name as per their guidelines.