Chennai: The TVK govt has planned to launch Singappen credit scheme for women entrepreneurs at an outlay of Rs 7,015 crore.Minister for cooperation V Gandhiraj announced in the assembly that the scheme was intended to “empower women socially and economically, to reduce rural poverty and enable them (women) to achieve financial independence”. The scheme will be implemented by cooperative societies where loans will be given to women enabling them to become entrepreneurs.The minister also announced that the TVK govt would provide rural business loan at 9% interest for micro and small-scale farmers. For the scheme, the state will allocate Rs 5,000 crore. The scheme will encourage farmers to undertake farm-related businesses, he said.In addition, state govt would introduce a common trademark logo in the name of “Vetri” for products produced by cooperative societies. The minister said that at present different names are used by different cooperative societies for their products due to which the market share and acceptance among the consumers was not sufficient.“A common logo will expand the market opportunities for cooperative products and will result in the growth of cooperative institutions and farmers’ income,” the minister said.The state govt will further expand the list of PDS shops supporting UPI payments. At present, UPI payment is enabled in 10,803 shops and the number will be increased by another 10,000, he said.The minister further announced that state govt will create a state cooperative policy to ensure sustained growth of cooperative societies.
