August 30, 2007	Thursday	Sha’aban 16, 1428

KARACHI, Aug 29: The new policy for SMEs (small and medium-sized enterprises) announced recently by the government has been criticised by business leaders who claim that it would not resolve basic problems.

President, Small and Medium Enterprises Alliance (Samea) Zafar Iqbal said that the SMEs have been demanding a clear-cut definition with regard to size, number of employees and capital.

However, the policy fails to resolve many important matters as it is total silent over the number of employees for SMEs.

He said it was expected that the number of employees required for registration with the EOBI and Sessi should have been increased up to 25.

Similarly, Zafar Iqbal said there was no provision of deregistration with these institutions if number of employees decreases from the prescribed limit.

He said labour laws should have been made very easy and simple for SMEs, and they should have been exempted from audit.

The SME policy should have ensured minimum number of government rules and regulation so that there would be minimum interaction with different government departments.

Looking at the rate of literacy, he said all official documents to be met and filed by SMEs should have been in Urdu. He demanded that collateral requirement for giving loans to SMEs should be removed.

Another leader of SMEs said for rapid growth of SMEs, the government should provide land at cheap rates and also give electricity at very low rate.

It would be best if industrial parks are established for SME with complete infrastructure, like power, water, gas, communications etc. They said all these demands are not covered in the new SME policy.