Industrial Parks Corporation Allots 3 Mn USD to Support Micro,Small Enterprises

Addis Ababa June 16/2020 (ENA) Industrial Parks Development Corporation announced that it has allocated 3 million USD for business-to-business linkage between micro and small enterprises and firms working in industrial parks. 

The program will benefit over 35 micro and small enterprises exposed to market and production disruptions due to COVID-19 pandemic.

Corporation Chief Executive Officer, Lelise Neme told ENA that the program would enable to improve the competitiveness of the enterprises in the targeted industrial parks and their linked industrial parks.

She added that business-to-business linkage project started in 2017 with 10 enterprises that benefited from the linkage by supplying a 1.2 million inputs to the industrial parks.

To date, the enterprises have  been  supplying cartons, poly bags, paper labels and pattern papers to industrial parks.

According to Lelise, “industrial parks are expected to play a key role in the country's journey to development and prosperity in the next decade. For us, liking micro and small enterprises  would bring about a positive impact on our import substitution ambition. Of course, we have gained fruitful results in this regard.”

However, COVID-19 has inflicted significant financial and market constraints on some of the micro and small enterprises.

Thus “the linkage with industrial parks will help the enterprises to strengthen themselves,” she stated.

The CEO said Industrial Parks Development Corporation has now started linking 35 enterprises both in manufacturing and services by giving priority to female-owned MSEs in order to enhance competitiveness and productivity.