The government has constituted a two-step loan fund for the development of the Small and Medium Enterprises (SME) under the central bank’s ‘Financial Sector Project for the development of Small and Medium Sized Enterprises’.

Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), the international development wing of Japan, will provide the funding for the project worth 5,000 million Japanese Yen.

The principal component of the fund is two step loan of taka 4.787.5 million yen.

Under the two step loan fund, participating financial institutes will be provided with re-finance or pre-finance for lending to SMEs.

An operating guidelines, named ‘Risk Management Guidelines’ has been developed in this regard comprising policies and procedure of this fund, by which the fund will be governed.

Banks and NBFIs interested in participating in this fund have to apply by March 27.

Talking to daily sun, general manager of Bangladesh Bank (SME and Special Programmes Department), Sukamal Sinha Chowdhury, said they have asked the interested banks to properly study the guidelines displayed at BB website before applying for the fund.

The Daily Sun/Bangladesh/ 14th March 2012