Workshop on empowering entrepreneurs to obtain bank loan facilities
Tuesday, 16 September 2014 00:01
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A two-day workshop was held on 12 and 13 September for development officers pertaining to empowering entrepreneurs in terms of their ability to secure bank loans at the Auditorium of the Hambantota District Secretariat.
It was organised by the Ministry of Traditional Industries and Small Enterprise Development in collaboration with the Central Bank of Sri Lanka and will be inaugurated under the chairmanship of Minister of Traditional Industries and Small Enterprise Development Douglas Devananda.
Secretary to Ministry of Traditional Industries and Small Enterprise Development Sivagnanasothy, senior regional officers and resource persons of the Central Bank of Sri Lanka, District Secretary of Hambantota R.D.C. Zoysa, Director of the Ministry M.C. Gamage and other officials participated in the workshop.
Sivagnanasothy stated that over 600 development officers will be benefitted through this financial literacy workshop.
As per ‘Mahinda Chintana’ Vision for the Future, facilitation to access to finance is considered as an important strategy to strengthen the small and medium industrialists economically. Banking clinics are being conducted island-wide under the guidance of Minister of Economic Development Basil Rajapaksa and the chairmanship of Minister Devananda.
This skill development workshop will be conducted with the view to strengthen financial literacy of the development officers covering all 12 divisional secretariats in the Hambantota district pertaining to empowering entrepreneurs in terms of their ability to secure bank loans. Accordingly, it has been proposed to implement the training through the resource persons of the Central Bank of Sri Lanka in collaboration with the Ministry of Traditional Industries and Small Enterprise Development. During the workshop, participants were enlightened on facilities provided by banks such as loan facilities offered to small and medium scale entrepreneurs, formulating and designing the projects, interest rates and repayment of loans, re-financing schemes such as prosperity loan, self-employment promotion initiative loan and Poverty Alleviation Micro Finance Scheme etc.
Access to Finance is one of the major problems faced by the small and medium industrialists. At this workshop, officers were empowered to work with small and medium industrialists who need loans through the state and private banks.
Sivagnanasothy stated that the same skill development and capacity development workshop which was held in Jaffna was a great success and arrangements have been made to conduct such workshops in Ampara, and other districts in near future. The Central Bank Governor Ajith Nivard Cabraal has been a great strength to take their program to the grassroots level. Subsequently, arrangements will be made to conduct banking clinics at district level in collaboration with the Central Bank of Sri Lanka in order to provide facilitation to access to credit for the small and medium industrialists.
