LAHORE -  The government has granted approval to five new SME development projects proposed by the Small and Medium Enterprises Development Authority (SMEDA) under Public Sector Development Program 2017-18, which will cost about Rs3.2 billion in total

Sher Ayub Khan, Chief Executive Officer SMEDA, has expressed deep gratitude to the Ministry of Industries and Production for seeking approval as well as allocation of funds for the five projects.

“The projects include National Business Development Program for SMEs (all over Pakistan), Product Development Center for Composites based Sports Goods (Sialkot), Fruits, Vegetables and Condiments Processing Center (Naushahro Feroze), Fruit Dehydration Unit (Swat) and Business Skill Development Centers for Women at various locations,” CEO SMEDA said, adding that allocations of Rs.250 million, Rs.287.77 million, Rs.321.5 million, Rs.20 million and Rs.28 million have respectively been made by the government for the year 2017-18 under PSDP for these projects.

Sher Ayub Khan, while addressing a meeting at SMEDA head office, informed that SMEDA entered into the ambit of PSDP projects in the year 2006 and it had handled a total portfolio of Rs 5798.20 million investment in about 27 PSDP projects so far and completed 19 projects country-wide. He informed that the SMEDA developed projects were being run as Common Facility Centers across the country under the management of private-public partnership. He said that the projects had provided the various clusters of SMEs with state-of-the art technology, training and capacity building services to meet the international export standards. He was glad to mention that the SMEs doing business in fruits processing, foundry, auto vendor industry, light engineering, red chilies, textile spinning and honey production fields had competed the export market because of the SMEDA’s Common Facility Centers.