More opportunities for MSMEs
Mentor Me program boosts bankers' confidence on MSMEs
THE banking sector is more confident to lend money now to micro, small, and medium enterprises (MSMEs) because of the Kapatid Mentor Me program of the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI).
Kapatid Mentor Me is one of the programs of DTI launched last year with the objective of scaling up existing MSMEs and to make them more competitive. The program also hopes to help the existing enterprises in expanding their market, improve the types of customers they can cater to, and to generate more employment.
This was first launched in Tubod, Lanao del Norte and started in Davao City in October of last year. It was then followed by a second batch March of this year. Last Friday, September 1, the Kapatid Mentor Me Batch 3 in Davao City was launched at the Marco Polo Hotel.
Each batch will be composed of only 20 mentees with the target of covering all provinces nationwide. There will be 10 modules per batch with the requirement of completion of a business improvement plan by the end of the 10th module.
“This business improvement plan is one of the requirements in this course. After they have undertaken their 10 modules, they are required to prepare a business improvement because in the module, they are assessed where they are now. What their weaknesses are and what they need to work on. They put that together in a plan. They are to follow that because that will be their roadmap in scaling up their businesses,” said Trade and Industry undersecretary Blesila Lantayona.
She added because of this plan, the banks are more willing to lend money for capital to the MSMEs that would be interested because of a more concrete and more comprehensive track they are to take for their business.
The banks themselves are seeking for these Kapatid Mentor Me program graduates to offer loans. They have booth installed in the venue in case the mentees would be interested in applying for loans. These include PNB, BPI’s BanKo, and BDO.
During the presentation of the business improvement plan, bank representatives are usually present and whenever they are interested and are attracted of a specific plan, they approach the entrepreneur.
Lantayona shared that in Agusan, Security Bank was able to lend a total of P30 million to 11 mentees to help them upgrade their own enterprises.