World Bank to give $750 mn to support 15 crore Indian MSMEs

New Delhi: The World Bank on Wednesday said it will give a $750 million-budget support to 15 crore MSMEs to increase liquidity access for viable small businesses impacted by Covid-19.

During the 2020 fiscal (July 2019-June 2020), World Bank has extended $5.13 billion loans to India-- which is the highest in a decade. This includes $2.75 billion given in three months in response to the Covid-19 pandemic.

World Bank Country Director in India Junaid Ahmad said this funding is under the multilateral lender’s Development Policy Law, which is a direct budget support. The funding would support the government’s initiative to protect the micro, small and medium enterprises (MSME) sector by unlocking liquidity, strengthening non-banking financial companies and small finance banks and enable inclusive access to financing.

Ahmad said in the next stage of the World Bank’s assistance programme for MSMEs, the multilateral lender would engage with the MSME Ministry and the states to ensure capacity development at cluster level. “World Bank’s board of executive directors has approved a $750 million MSME Emergency Response program to support increased flow of finance into the hands of MSMEs, severely impacted by the Covid-19 crisis,” World Bank said in a statement.

Earlier, the lender had approved a funding of $1 billion each for social and health sector for support during the pandemic.