Mumbai, May 8 (KNN) The Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT) and CreditEnable, a UK fintech specializing in credit solutions for the SME sector, have together launched a Changemakers program to secure affordable finance for 70 million Indian Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs).

The aim of Changemakers Program is to ensure that Indian SMEs can access billions in available funding that is available, but not accessible. The program will help plug in more than USD 320 USD billion gap in affordable credit

The first phase of the Changemakers campaign will involve appointing 1000 influential leaders from within the CAIT organization and embedding dedicated staff within 24,450 CAIT trade associations across 14 states in India to kick-start the program on a national basis.

CAIT members joining the CreditEnable, Changemakers Program will be trained to assist their fellow SMEs to understand the loan process and help them to secure credit at competitive and affordable rates through CreditEnable’s technology-enabled marketplace which currently matches SME borrowers to lenders in India.

Components of the training provided to CAIT members through the program will include vital things like, types of documentation a bank need from an SME in order to approve a loan, factor that makes a company creditworthy from a bank’s perspective and what company can do to improve its creditworthiness and improve its likelihood of securing a loan.

The global market for SME credit stands at is $8.1 USD trillion. The global SME credit gap is estimated $4.5 USD trillion. India is the first stage for CreditEnable, whose ambitions are global.

Chief Executive Officer of CreditEnable, Nadia Sood said “Our mission is to help SMEs everywhere avail of affordable finance so they can live out their full potential. Indian SMEs are arguably the largest potential business growth area globally and are restricted only by the lack of affordable finance.”

Sood said that currently the vast majority of Indian SMEs are forced to secure financing from the informal market at rates that often exceed 30-40%.

“We are delighted to be working with CAIT, the world’s largest SME association, to identify and train CreditEnable Changemakers who can help unlock the vast potential of the SME segment”, she added.

“Technology is a great enabler, but we need to build a bridge between lenders and borrowers which allows them to understand and trust each other. That is what CreditEnable is all about and the Changemakers program is a clear example of how we are executing on our values and our vision”, Sood added.

Secretary General of CAIT, Praveen Khandelwal said “Our partnership with CreditEnable is going to be instrumental to making this access possible. We are delighted to be launching this important initiative with them at such a large scale and on a pan-India basis”.