RAJSHAHI, Oct 1, 2021 (BSS) - SME Financing Company Limited, a subsidiary
company of Rajshahi Krishi Unnayan Bank (RAKUB), has disbursed Small and
Medium Enterprise (SME) loan worth Taka 67.79 crore.

   The loans were disbursed among 6,105 SME entrepreneurs' aims at promoting
the sector in different potential areas of Rajshahi region during the current
2020-21 fiscal year.

  It has also recovered loans of Taka 67.46 cr from 5,203 borrowers during
the same period.

  The company also adopted special measures of disbursing loan worth Taka
10.80 crore among 1,286 women entrepreneurs in the SME sector for their
economic development.

  The company has set the target of disbursing loans worth Taka 95 crore and
recovering loans of Taka 87 crore in the current fiscal.

   These were revealed in the 34th virtual meeting of the governing council
of the company held at the Board room of RAKUB headquarters here yesterday.

   Chaired by Roisul Alam Mondal, chairman of the council and RAKUB, the
meeting was addressed, among others, by RAKUB Managing Director Ismail
Hossain, council members Golam Mostofa and Professor Rustam Ali Ahmed, RAKUB
General Managers Joynal Abedeen and Joynal Islam and Chief Executive Officer
of the company Abdullah Salahuddin Gazi.

   Roisul Alam asked the company officials to expedite the SME credit
programme through intensifying motivational, awareness building and
monitoring activities so that the target group of the people can derive its
total benefits.

   Terming the promising SME sector as labour-intensive he viewed that
successful promotion of the sector could be the effective means of
alleviating poverty, generating employment side by side with accelerating
economic growth.

   SME promotion is very important for reducing the existing gap between
rural and urban areas besides recouping the losses caused by the adverse
impact of Covid-19 pandemic, he added.

   The meeting was told that the SME loan was disbursed among the
entrepreneurs in 43 upazilas of Rajshahi, Chapainawabganj, Natore, Naogaon,
Pabna, Sirajganj, Bogura, Joypurhat and Kurigram districts.

   Main objectives of the loans are of creating an intensive investment scope
for the agro-based SMEs in the light of the government industrial policy and
for supplementing the government's efforts to attain food security and
economic emancipation.

   Various business fields especially software, agro-processing and its
business, agriculture, plantation, fisheries, poultry, tissue culture,
leather goods, health service and diagnostic centres and education services
have been selected for investment as small and medium enterprise loans.