Kuala Lumpur, 11 December 2020 – More than 150 small and medium enterprises (SMEs) have participated in the SMEs Sustainable Exporters Programme under a collaboration between the Malaysia External Trade Development Corporation (MATRADE) and CIMB Group Holdings Bhd.
In a statement today, MATRADE said the programme’s objective is to help SMEs become agile, and resilient to unprecedented risks while adopting sustainability principles and ways to start by conducting due diligence on their value chain.
“Under the programme, SMEs from the sub-sectors comprising food and beverage, machinery parts and components, medical equipment, furniture and fashion (garments and cosmetics) were trained.
“These SMEs collectively dedicated 400 hours of online orientation on various economic, environmental, social and governance aspects that could potentially create new opportunities for resilient growth,” it said.
CIMB Islamic Bank Bhd chief executive officer (CEO), Ahmad Shahriman Mohd Shariff, said the programme managed to help SMEs to build more robust and all-inclusive risk preparedness and risk management mechanisms.
“On their sustainability journey, SMEs can have access to sustainable financing solutions, new markets through CIMB’s Trade Club as well as knowledge and technical resources through our partner, IMPACTO Sdn Bhd,” he said.
Meanwhile, MATRADE deputy CEO, Sharimahton Mat Saleh said the programme will be scaled up to reach out to more SMEs especially from the East Coast, and Sabah and Sarawak.
“SMEs need to be more resilient in dealing with export markets and they need to be aware of the hidden risks and opportunities in their value chain, particularly in adopting sustainability principles to grow into globally-relevant and competitive enterprises of the future,” she added.
-BERNAMA
