Experts suggested the microfinance institutitions Sunday (MFIs) to provide loans for manufacturing and productive micro enterprises (MEs) considering the business risk and product quality.
They also noted MEs have been contributing a lot in creating employment in the country and increasing people's income. But still the policy and attitude of the government towards the sector is not clear and there is lack of coordination among the product development organisations and financing organizations which is hampering the sectors growth.
Their views came at a discussion on 'Role of Micro-Enterprises in Economic Growth' at Bangabandhu International Conference Centre in the city on the concluding day of the two-day national convention on ''Towards Poverty Alleviation and Social Development: The Role of Microfinance Institutetions (MFIs)'.
The event which began Saturday, was jointly organised by Institute of Microfinance (InM), Micro Credit Regulatory Authority (MRA) and Palli Karma Shahayak Foundation (PKSF).
InM executive director Professor MA Baqui Khalily chaired and moderated the session while PKSF deputy managing director Mohammad Jashim Uddin was present as the lead speaker.
In his paper, Mr Jashim said MEs have important contribution in creating new employment opportunity while non-farm activities employ more than 31 million people, equivalent to 40 per cent of the country's population aged 15 years and above.
Referring to a recent study by Prof Khalily, he said based on average full time employment of 1.64 persons per micro enterprise, some 3.7 million people are employed full time in 2.3 million MEs.
According to World Development Report 2011, the contribution of SMEs in the country's GDP was 17.92 per cent in 2009 which was 15.23 per cent in 2000, he added.
Study shows, the households with MEs have higher income and expenditure. In a data, it was found per capita income of a household (HH) with ME was Tk 1168.7 in 2000 against the HH without ME Tk 778.9. In 2005, the income of the HH with ME rose to Tk 1210.4 and in 2010 Tk 1612.6 while income of the HH without ME increased to Tk 851.4 in 2005 and Tk 1184.9 in 2010.
There are 0.6 million ME borrowers in the country. Cumulative disbursement to partner organizations (POs) is Tk 25,763 million, loan outstanding with POs is Tk 9228 million, cumulative disbursement to the borrowers Tk 179,444 million, outstanding loan with borrowers Tk 27747.6 million and average loan size is Tk 82, 500.
