New Delhi, Nov 22 (KNN)  The MSME Ministry has come out with a draft scheme of fund to promote innovation and entrepreneurship in the agro industry.  It has now invited comments and suggestions from all stakeholders to the proposed scheme.

The Scheme is in follow up of the Finance Minister’s suggestion to establish a technology centre network to promote innovation, entrepreneurship and agro industry with a fund of Rs 200 crore in his budget speech.  He had also suggested to put in place a programme to facilitate forward and backward linkages with multiple chain of manufacturing and service delivery and also to take up a nationwide ‘District level Incubation and Accelerator Programme’ for incubation of new ideas and providing necessary support for accelerating entrepreneurship, according to official data.

The main objectives of the scheme are to create new jobs and reduce employment; promote entrepreneurship culture in India; grassroots economic development at the district level; facilitate innovative business solution for unmet social needs; and promote innovation to further strengthen the competitiveness of the MSME sector.

On how the scheme would address current problems, there is a need for establishing a network, building a database of efforts of first generation entrepreneurs so that they are accessible to entrepreneurs to convert them into commercial ventures.  This would provide a platform for sharing best practices, technological advancements and bring up ground realities to influence policy change.

The scheme would also help in the development of rural economy.  Creating employment opportunities in rural areas could be done by setting up small enterprises in agro based industry on which nearly 70 per cent of the population is dependent upon.

It would also facilitate use of innovative means of finance to leverage the available funds to cater to a larger number of entrepreneurs.

As far as the corpus is concerned, it will be dedicated to automation of agricultural practices and activities related thereto; value addition to agriculture and forest produce; recycling of agricultural pre/post harvest wastages, off farm but farm linked, animal husbandry, etc; business models for aggregation and value addition relevant for rural areas; business models for creation of local employment in rural areas; and business models for social impact.  Other activities can be taken up with the approval of the governing council of the fund, it said.

The programme components would involve creating a database of technologies available with various government / private agencies to set up a network of technology centres for handholding of prospective entrepreneurs of the MSME sector.  The database and network of technology centres would be used to incubate and covert the technology into products so that prospective entrepreneurs can set up commercial enterprises with specific outcomes.

In addition, human resources would be developed to mentor and handhold the incubatees in the incubation centres. 

Further, a framework will be created for startup promotion through SIDBI by using innovative means of finance like Venture Capital, Impact Funds, Challenge Funds, etc to enable ideas/innovation with creativity and scalability to come to the fore and convert these into commercial enterprises with specific outcomes. 

While encouraging innovative ideas, technologies and business strategies by instituting awards and programmes to drive growth, it would provide funds for commercialisation of such award winning innovative ideas.

Another programme component is to implement the Incubation and Commercialisation of Business Ideas Programme through technical/research institutes including those in the field of agro based industry.

The broad framework of the Scheme would cover Livelihood Incubation Centres, Technology Business Incubation Model, and Startup Promotion.  (KNN/ES)