BB, Brac Bank organise workshop on SME financing

Bangladesh Bank (BB) and Brac Bank jointly organized a virtual workshop last week for enhancing the knowledge of the latter's officials on SME financing.

The virtual workshop took place on 5 January at the head office of Brac Bank in the capital's Tejgaon area, reads a press release on Monday by Brac Bank.

BB lent resources to run the workshop. It was a part of the Second Small and Medium-Sized Enterprise Development Project (SMEDP-2), funded by the Asian Development Bank (ADB).

Prashanta Mohan Chakraborty, joint director of BB and project manager of SMEDP-2, and Mahfuza Akter Tenni, assistant director of BB and project officer of SMEDP-2, were resource persons for the workshop.

The trainers discussed BB's guidelines and initiatives regarding SME financing, gave an overview of policies and guidelines of SMEDP-2, and also talked about the application procedures and common mistakes of refinancing applications in the capacity building workshop.

AKM Fazlur Rahman, executive director, BB and project director of SMEDP-2 was the chief guest at the workshop, while Rezaul Karim Sarkar, deputy general manager, BB and deputy project director of SMEDP-2, was present as a special guest.

Selim RF Hussain, the managing director and CEO of Brac Bank, and Syed Abdul Momen, Head of SME, were also present during the programme.

Cottage, Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprises (CMSMEs) are considered the lifeblood of emerging economies. BB is contributing significantly to promote such enterprises in Bangladesh. The bank issued an FID circular no.01/2017 on 15 November 15 2017 to implement SMEDP-2.

The primary objective of the development project is to ensure easy access to finance for the CMSMEs located outside of the Dhaka and Chattogram metropolitan areas. The loans are disbursed to the CMSMEs through the Participating Financial Institutions (PFIs). Around 21 banks and 12 NBFIs (non-banking financial institutions) have signed agreements as PFIs in the project.