Partha Chatterjee, Minister–in–charge, Department of Commerce and Industries, IT, Public Enterprises and Industrial Reconstruction, Government of West Bengal will address the 4th India MSME Summit to be held in Kolkata on January 19, 2012 at Hotel Hindusthan International.
The summit is being organised by the Federation of Indian Micro and Small & Medium Enterprises (FISME), New Delhiin collaboration with the Federation of Small & Medium Industries (FOSMI), West Bengal. This is the first time that the summit, a flagship annual event of FISME, is being organised in eastern India. The theme of the summit is 'Revival of Industries in WB- Preparing the Ground’.
“The MSME sector is backbone of Indian economy and we believe any attempt at reviving the industrial fortunes of West Bengal, once the most industrialised state in India, must also begin with a sharp focus on the MSME sector,” said Mr V.K. Agarwal, President of FISME, India’s largest organisation of micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs), while explaining the reasons behind selecting the theme for this year’s summit.
Following the global economic meltdown of September, 2008, FISME took up the task of organising annual MSME summits with the aim of creating a credible platform for dialogue among MSMEs and all MSME stakeholders including policy makers in government, academicians, economists and institutional leaders. Three such annual summits have already been organised in the past – the first in New Delhi in 2009, the second in New Delhi in 2010 and the third in Bangalore in 2011.
This year’s Summit will comprise three sessions-Developing Hard & Soft Infrastructure in MSME Clusters, New Age Financing Options for Fast Growing MSMEs and New Opportunities for MSMEs:Public Procurement and Railways. The objective is to provide key inputs to the new government of West Bengal under the dynamic leadership of Smt Mamata Bannerjee for preparing strategies for industrial revival. Around 300 MSME’s from eastern India states such as West Bengal, Bihar, Jharkhand, Orissa and the seven sisters of north eastern India will participate in the summit.