The Small and Medium Enterprises Development Authority (SMEDA) will set up 1000 industrial stitching units under different phases of the Public Sector Development Programme (PSDP) while it will establish 150 stitching units during next three years in the first phase of the PSDP.
The Ministry of Commerce and Textile (MoCT) and SMEDA have inked an agreement for establishing industrial stitching units. MoCT Senior Joint Secretary (Textile Division) Masood ul Hassan Qureshi, and SMEDA's General Manager (Outreach), Javed Khattak signed the agreement on behalf of their respective organizations.
According to the agreement SMEDA has been declared the executing agency for "Phase-1 of the project whereas Textile Division of the Ministry of Commerce and Textile is the sponsoring ministry for completing the project. SMEDA shall implement the stitching units' project as per its own policy and procedures and according to the approved PC-1. Furthermore, SMEDA will design an operation manual for the project. To monitor and supervise the implementation process, SMEDA will place staff and its officials engaged with the project throughout Pakistan, at provincial and regional offices.
Both the parties shall constitute the Project Steering and Scrutinizing Committees to look after the overall policy formulation, implementation and outcomes as set in the PC-1 and to scrutinize the eligibility of each applicant before subsidizing the stitching center respectively.
The agreement is valid for the next three years which will be extended automatically for another period of same duration. It is notable that the project has been envisaged to promote public private partnership to boost the value addition in the field of textile garments by establishing industrial stitching units by strengthening small and medium entrepreneurs.
In this project 60 percent funding for the machines will be provided from PSDP through the same project by the Ministry of Commerce and Textile and 40 percent would be borne by the owner of the stitching units. The Project Management Unit (PMU) will be established at SMEDA Head Office Lahore.