SIDBI inks MoU with Jeevika Bihar & UMED Maharashtra

New Delhi: The Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI) in association with Women’s World Banking has inked a MOU with Jeevika Bihar and UMED Maharashtra, to extend Prayaas Scheme to State Rural Livelihood Missions to ensure over 50 lakhs women of low income group to get access to affordable credit.
This partnership will help in unlocking the potential of Cluster Level Federations (CLFs) and will establish a new and scalable credit distribution ecosystem. SIDBI in the pilot phase will partner 35-40 CLFs across Bihar and Maharashtra with a target of serving affordable credit of up to Rs 2 lakhs to 5,000 Women Entrepreneurs.
Under the scheme, enterprise growth loans of up to Rs 2 lakhs will be available to women MSMEs across rural Maharashtra and Bihar, a press release said.
This partnership will catalyse SIDBI’s goal of impacting 500,000 informal micro enterprises by piloting the Direct Credit Under Partnership Arrangements by 2025.
Women’s World Banking has been collaborating with SIDBI & SRLMs to develop a market-driven solution that will provide long-term economic stability to Women-led SHG Cluster-level Federations (CLFs). The CLFs are acting as a Partner Institution with SIDBI for this project.
WWB is extending manpower support to CLFs on capacity building, reinforcement of Prayaas technical and process know how for successful pilot. It is supported by a grant from MetLife Foundation as part of its commitment to fostering inclusive economic mobility for underserved and underrepresented communities.
SIDBI has earmarked Rs 50 Crores during the pilot testing phase of the proposed model. Once successful, this will be scaled-up to unlock the potential of Women led Cluster Level Federations to act as partners with lending institutions to offer affordable credit to enterprising women members from SHGs.
This program entails WWB working on ground with select cluster level federations to identify enterprising individual members of SHGs to avail of individual loans. The loan to borrowers is sanctioned based on Digital Assessment through Straight Through Process (STP).
Mr Sivasubramanian Ramann, CMD, SIDBI said, “Through this partnership with SRLMs, we aim to facilitate affordable credit to aspiring women entrepreneurs from low-income groups and may have experience only in group lending.
I am confident that the Individual Enterprise Scheme for SHG Women program will strengthen CLFs and make affordable credit available to enterprising rural women across India to grow their ventures. SIDBI recognises MetLife Foundation’s commitment and support in this journey.”
UNI