Deal to help MSMEs gain access to loans inked

By: Aileen Garcia-Yap August 27,2014 - 09:13 AM

Small and medium entrepreneurs will soon have access to loans of up to P5 million to finance their businesses.

This developed after the Cebu Chamber of Commerce and Industry (CCCI) and the Confederation of Philippine Exporters Foundation (Philexport Cebu) partnered with The Small Business Corp. (SBCorp.) for a program that will enable those in the small, micro, and medium enterprises sector to have access to development finance.

The MSME sector is very important as its development will result to the creation of more jobs that will help the country ensure a sustained economy, said CCCI president Ma. Teresa Chan during the signing of the agreement yesterday.

“By 2050, 47 percent of the country’s population is at working age or 18 to 60 years old,” said Chan, who added that MSMEs can help provide jobs and fuel more growth for the country which is now seen as a rising star in the world.

The partnership aims to tap into CCCI and Philexport networks to help make MSMEs aware that SBCorp has products to offer that will help them in growing their business.

Under the agreement, the CCCI and PhilExport Cebu will refer at least 100 MSMEs who are interested to apply for loans from SBCorp.

CCCI past president Jerry Sta. Ana said that they are confident they can refer more than 100 enterprises to avail of the loans.

SBCorp, for their part, will prioritize and expedite processing of the loans from the referred enterprises.

“Target is to process everything within 30 days for the small businessmen to really have credit available from the government,” said SBCorp officer-in-charge Ma. Luna E. Cacanando.

SBCorp will provide loans from P200,000 to P5 million to the enterprises.

“Currently we have P4 billion available funds for direct loans for SMEs and we target to lend to 5,000 by 2018,” she said.

As of 2013, there are only 700 who availed of direct loans from SBCorp, about 150 are from Cebu.

“Hopefully, we can achieve our target by 2018 and provide more direct loans to more MSMEs.”

SBCorp will also be conducting regular forums every second Friday of the month at the CCCI training room for the members of both CCCI and PhilExport.

Alan Suarez, Philexport Cebu president, said the partnership can help their members especially those down the supply chain.

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