'Atma Nirbhar Abhiyan’ MSME eMarketplace to boost Digital Lending

        I firmly believe in the Joy of Safe ePayments.

The announcement by Smr.Nirmala Sitharaman, India’s Finance Minister on 13^th May 2020 regarding ‘MSME eMarketplace’, cheered my heart.  

The working details will be rolled out in the next few days. Any delay will further hamper the recovery of MSME Units from COVID19 effects.

MSME eMarketplace will replace traditional Trade Exhibitions. In Trade exhibitions, MSMEs set up stalls to familiarise potential buyers with their products.

Under the new SOPs, conducting trade exhibitions will be difficult and cumbersome. Hence eMarketplace is the new approach to replace the traditional awareness meets.

Quote:

We are developing an e-market portal like Alibaba. We will call it Bharat Craft. This will provide a direct interface between buyers and sellers. In the next 2-3 years this portal will bring a turnover of about .`10 lakh crore to the MSME sector,” Gadkari said via an email communication. The government is looking at the MSME sector for its huge potential to generate income and employment, boost exports and its contribution to economic growth.

Reference: Economic Times article updated on Sep 10, 2019, 07.56am

Unquote:

There are plans to showcase MSMEs in the new version of GeM i.e GeM4. However, MSME eMarketplace will have a sharper focus on MSMEs with possibility of Transaction Based Financing.

Smt.Nirmala Sitharaman, India’s Finance Minister, mentioned that government and central public sector enterprises will release all pending MSME payments in 45 days.

The minister also said that fintech enterprises will be used to boost transaction-based lending using the data by the e-marketplace. This e-market for developing linkages for MSMEs will be promoted to replace trade fairs and exhibitions.

The quality of data generated on MSME eMarketplace will determine the success rate of transaction-based financing. New gen fintech companies will have a chance to be part of the MSME eMarketplace.

Government of India’s MSME Ministry recognises the following modes of Digital Transactions:

1. Credit Card

2. Debit Card

3. Bharat QR Code

4. Bharat Interface for Money (BHIM)

5. Mobile Wallets

6. Net Banking

7. Prepaid Cards

8. National electronics Fund Transfer (NEFT)

9. Real Time Gross Settlements (RTGS)

10.Unified Payments interface (UPI)

11.USSD (*99#)

12.Immediate Payments Service (IMPs)

13.Aadhaar enabled Payments System (AePS)

14.BHIM Aadhaar

15.National Automated Clearing House (NACH)

16.Aadhaar Payment Bridge System (APBS)

17.National Financial Switch (NFS)

18.National Electronics Toll Collection (NETC)

19.Bharat Bill Payments System (BBPS)

Every month, MSMEs can upload the value and volumes of Digital and Non-Digital Transactions on a dedicated portal.

This enables the decision-makers to fine-tune their approach to boost digital transactions.