Covid-hit MSMEs have now urged the government to enable them home delivery of goods in the course of the lockdown period without the need of a distinction amongst important and non-important solutions. The concept was component of a quantity of suggestions place forth to the government by the MSME body Federation of Indian Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (FISME) on Tuesday “to enable MSMEs to create and sustain their livelihood during lockdowns culminating the learnings from the first and second wave of Covid-19,” the federation mentioned. It also sought priority vaccination for home delivery personnel as frontline workers.
“It is not just food or grocery or medicines etc., your computer is also an essential product when you are working from home. So, what was treated as essential and non-essential last year, we cannot operate with those rules now. You need almost everything. What if your air conditioner breaks down now? Won’t it be an essential thing for you to buy a new one? Anything that can be safely delivered at home should be allowed. Safety is important and not what you are getting home delivered,” Anil Bhardwaj, Secretary General, FISME told TheSpuzz Online.
The federation also advisable ease of undertaking on the web small business for smaller enterprises by decreasing “compliance (GST) burdens and registration norms.” This would go a extended way in enabling digitisation of MSMEs, it added. Further, protection against vandalism or police action for home delivery personnel with e-commerce and MSMEs was also amongst the crucial asks. “States must desist from making arbitrary changes to lockdown guidelines and must give a steady policy for a three-week period. This helps MSMEs manage their working capital and sustain their businesses. Any form of discontinuity or restriction of their businesses can lead to wiping out their existence itself,” mentioned Bhardwaj.
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MSMEs in many sectors viz., retail, aviation, hospitality, and other people, which had been amongst the worst hit due to Covid last year, had neared the pre-pandemic level recovery prior to the second Covid wave struck post February 2021. For instance, according to retailers’ body Retailers Association of India, month-to-month recovery of the retail sector had neared pre-Covid level for the month of February with sales touching 93 per cent in the course of the month in comparison to February 2020. The association had anticipated a complete recovery in March.
RAI, on its component, had also made suggestions to the Ministry of Finance and the Reserve Bank of India earlier this month. This integrated extending the added benefits of ECLGS 3. to retail corporations with added funding, announcing a moratorium on principal and interest for six months for the 26 stressed sectors beneath ECLGS, mandating banks to give ad-hoc working capital loans of 30 per cent more than present limits so that essential payments like salaries and wages can be made, and delivering Interest subvention to lessen the burden of interest. According to the association, the retail sector represented an investment of Rs 2,50,000 crore even though nearly Rs 75,000 crore could turn NPA if urgent measures to ease the working capital challenges are not taken.