He made the announcement while addressing the concluding session of the “5th Buyer-Seller Conference” organised by SME Foundation at the Midas Centre in the city on Monday as chief guest.

He said that creating a separate and permanent marketplace will help encourage SME sector and also create more new opportunities for employment.

“This has been a part of our election agenda as we always prefer the promotion of SME sector”, he noted.

With SME Foundation chairman KM Habibullah in the chair, the function was also addressed by the organisation’s managing director Md Shafiqul Islam, owner of Sada-Kalo Fashion House Azharul Haque Azad, Fashion Enterprise Association president Shahin Ahmed and women entrepreneurs Tahmina Amin and Parvin Akhtar.

Appreciating the role of SME Foundation for promoting the SME sector, the Industries Minister said now a good number of women entrepreneurs are being created for its supportive role.

He said the Industries Ministry will take measures to protect the SME entrepreneurs and also their market price as per the instructions of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.     

Other speakers, especially the SME entrepreneursm while addressing the function alleged that despite clear instructions from Bangladesh Bank, many banks still refrain from sanctioning loans to SME entrepreneurs at lower interest rates.

They said the banks mainly feel interested to provide loans to big entrepreneurs even though they turn out to be the biggest defaulters.