Exim Mitra for services to SMEs

To encourage small enterprises to export, the Export-Import Bank of India (Exim Bank) plans to start a portal ‘Exim Mitra’. It aims to facilitate 20-25 services, including registration for undertaking exports, information on the closest bank branch that will provide export credit, and indicative freight cost. While big companies have a well-oiled infrastructure set-up to take care of their exports, small enterprises are at sixes and sevens when it comes to dealing with the procedures related to exports. 

Hence, Exim Bank proposes to start a portal to provide facilitation services for the latter. Exim Bank Chairman and Managing Director Yaduvendra Mathur said: “We are looking to open an online facilitation window. We note there is a big information gap. There are a large number of potential exporters, typically smaller companies which are not able to access the whole gamut of facilities and there are many agencies involved (for exports).”

Apart from making easy procedures via portal, the Exim Bank is looking at putting up a structure so that an exporter can get an estimate of the freight cost of an export consignment. It is talking to logistics companies also to give macro figures like the per kilometer cost if an export consignment goes from Mumbai Port to Peru. This will help an Indian company/ manufacturer take a decision on whether to service a particular export market.