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New Delhi, February 15, 2007 -
The IFC SouthAsia Enterprise Development Facility will support UTI Bank in expanding its operations to Northeast India, with the objective of improving access to finance for micro, small, and medium enterprises (MSME).
Welcoming the partnership, Asok Kumar, Executive Director of UTI Bank, said, “UTI Bank is a member of the Committee on Financial Sector Plan for the Northeast region and we are actively looking at various strategies for financial inclusion of its people. We are expanding our branch network in the region, and MSME sector is an area of keen interest to us. A collaboration with IFC’s facility fits well with our overall plan. Our bank is expected to benefit from the rich experience of IFC-SEDF and would like to bring in international best practices in smaller business lending to the Northeast.”
While signing the memorandum of understanding today, Anil Sinha, General Manager of IFC-SEDF, said, “The opportunity to work with UTI Bank is in line with our commitment to facilitate and strengthen private enterprise growth in Northeast India. We will collaborate with UTI Bank in developing appropriate banking products and services and building their institutional capacity through training. We will also introduce best practice environmental and social considerations in a challenging environment, drawing on IFC’s international expertise.” Mr. Sinha is also the South Asia Regional Coordinator for IFC’s advisory services, an increasingly large component of the Corporation’s contribution to private sector growth in developing regions.
The scope of the collaboration will include:
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Developing a profitable micro, small, and medium enterprise business model, supporting service-based marketing linkages and export-oriented operations, particularly for enterprises involved in value-added agricultural production
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Supporting development of micro, small, and medium enterprise raw material production clusters
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Encouraging adoption of environmental and social policies
IFC-SEDF has its office in Guwahati and has a focused attention on Northeast India. Over the last three years IFC-SEDF has worked in Agri-business, Livestock and Private Healthcare Sectors. Working on a partnership basis, key success stories in Northeast India include the introduction of a new retail chain of drug stores, alternative crops in tea gardens, poultry layer birds and rural business hubs. In future, IFC-SEDF intends to work with private sector SMEs in the areas of organic farming and building of appropriate value chains.
About IFC
IFC, the private sector arm of the World Bank Group, promotes open and competitive markets in developing countries. IFC supports sustainable private sector companies and other partners in generating productive jobs and delivering basic services, so that people have opportunities to escape poverty and improve their lives. Through FY06, IFC Financial Products has committed more than $56 billion in funding for private sector investments and mobilized an additional $25 billion in syndications for 3,531 companies in 140 developing countries. IFC Advisory Services and donor partners have provided more than $1 billion in program support to build small enterprises, to accelerate private participation in infrastructure, to improve the business enabling environment, to increase access to finance, and to strengthen environmental and social sustainability. For more information, please visit
www.ifc.org
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About IFC-SEDF
The IFC SouthAsia Enterprise Development Facility is a multidonor funded facility managed and operated by IFC. It is one of the 11 regional programs managed by IFC worldwide. Set up to promote the growth of SMEs in the region, IFC-SEDF is funded by IFC, the governments of Netherlands and Norway, and the European Commission, DFID (UK), CIDA (Canada), and the Asian Development Bank. It provides increased access to finance and quality business development services to projects in Bangladesh, Bhutan, Northeast India, the Maldives, Nepal, and Sri Lanka. IFC-SEDF also helps create an enabling business environment and supports value addition to firms through tailored enterprise and organization-specific advisory services, capacity building programs, training, and research.
About UTI Bank
UTI Bank was the first of the new private banks that began bank operations in India in 1994. It now has a network of more than 505 branch offices and extension counters and well over 2,200 ATMs, creating one of the largest ATM networks in the country. The bank has strengths in both retail and corporate banking and is committed to adopting the best industry practices internationally in order to achieve excellence.
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