SIALKOT: Sialkot Chamber of Commerce and Industry (SCCI) President Mansoor Ahmed on Sunday said that SCCI had focused its special attention towards enhancing export volume to help strengthen the national economy.
Talking to APP, he said that strengthening of national economy had become imperative at this juncture and business community of Sialkot was ready to play its vibrant role with missionary zeal in this regard. The SCCI President underscored the need of promotion and strengthening the SME sector for doubling the export volume.
Sialkot is an export-oriented city and hub of cottage industry which represents SME sector and playing its significant role not only in providing employment opportunities but also strengthening the national exchequer, he said.
Mansoor said that SCCI had focused its special attention on the promotion of SME sector of Sialkot and initiated a series of programmes for creating awareness among the SMEs about the fast changing business trends and modern technology enabling them to play their frontline role in enhancing the trade volume. “We are considering to arrange foreign tours for SMEs with the active cooperation of Commerce Ministry and Trade Development Authority of Pakistan (TDAP),” he said.
The SCCI President further said that a majority of local SMEs were running their business on self-finance bases and without any government assistance, adding that basically unique export culture of Sialkot is based on SMEs set-up and there are very few big industrial units and by virtue this Sialkot is earning US 2 billion dollars through its exports annually.
The step was being taken for the capacity building of SMEs and enabling them to reduce production cost and further improve the quality of their products to cope with the international markets easily, he said. He said that maximum participation of SMEs would be ensured in trade delegations while seminars and workshops would also be arranged for creating awareness among the SMEs about the advancement of international markets, he added.
The SCCI, he said, ‘Khud Kifalat Rozgar Trust’ had been initiated through philanthropic business community of Sialkot aimed at promoting well-being of poor and the needy segment of society. The concept of this project was to provide financial assistance to the people with limited financial resources to help them generate employment or business opportunities, he said.
The financial assistance was being extended in the form of interest-free loans to be paid back to trust in pre-agreed instalments, he said.
Mansoor revealed the project had introduced various schemes like new CNG rickshaw and Qarz-e-Hasna which would benefit the needy. “We feel satisfaction that the project contributing towards poverty alleviation and lowering the graph of unemployment,” he said.
Highly cordial relations were being developed with foreign mission functioning in Pakistan for obtaining visa for the SCCI members while strong relations would also be strengthened with Pakistani High Commissions abroad for the projection of Pakistani products, he added.
