'No progress unless women become active part of trade, industry'

The country cannot achieve the goal of economic prosperity without making the women an active part of trade and industry. The Small and Medium Enterprises Development Authority (SMEDA) Chief Executive Office Yousuf Naseem Khokhar stated this while addressing the concluding ceremony of three-day "Spring Gala- 2011" at Women Business Incubation Center (WBIC).
General Manager Out-reach, Syed Iqbal Anwar Kidwai, General Manager Policy and Planning Bakhtiar Khan, Provincial Chief SMEDA- Punjab Alamgir Chaudhry, and Project Manager, WBIC Maimona Sattar were also present on the occasion. SMEDA CEO expressed satisfaction over WBIC services for enhancing role of women in SME sector and said that the center had provided women with a wide range of modern facilities to set up and run their own businesses. He appreciated WBIC management for organising Spring Gala-2011 for women enterprises. However, he emphasised to arrange more exhibitions to provide women entrepreneurs with strong marketing support.
Khokhar said that government had granted approval to set up more women business centres in various cities at the pattern of WBIC, Lahore. Such centres were near to completion in Karachi, Peshawar and Quetta, he added. Maimona Sattar, while giving a briefing about the project said that a large number of women had graduated from the center during last three years. She said that the center, besides providing business facilitation, had also been organising a series of valuable training programmes and exhibitions for potential business women.