SME regional caravan kicks off in Pagadian City

By Michael Vincent D. Cajulao

Tuesday 3rd of July 2012

PAGADIAN CITY, July 3 (PIA) -– This year’s run of the Regional Small and Medium Enterprise caravan kicked off in Pagadian City yesterday, in time for the yearly observance of SME Week in July.

Dubbed the 2012 Enhanced SME Caravan, the activity aims to show how it progressed since its inception in 2005 in region 9.

Department of Trade and Industry assistant regional director Sitti Amina Jain said the national government has now recognized the role of the caravan in improving the status of SMEs in the country.

“We have been doing this since 2005 and have since become a regular activity and the banner program of the SME Regional Core Group through ACCESS or the Agency Convergence for Comprehensive Entrepreneurship Support Services. And it is now recognized by the national government and is now being conducted in other regions, thus it’s called Enhance Caravan”, Dr. Jain said.

According to Jain, the caravan is also seen as an aid to spur regional economic growth and eventually as a contribution to the national goal of income improvement for SMEs and poverty reduction.

To help attain this goal, DTI brought experts on business operation and product development to arm SMEs with the necessary knowledge.

One expert brought in by DTI is Rosa Fernandez, assistant head of the Intellectual Property Office of the Philippines Field Operation, who informed the participants the importance of intellectual property rights.

“Intellectual Property Rights adds value to your products, and improve our lives. If there are no innovations, no patent, and design, there will be less improvement in the way we live”, Fernandez said.

Fernandez said part of their job is to help protect creations varying from trademark to copyright, among others that are intangible.

By registering with them, the name, trademark, and other related rights will be protected, making sure that other are prohibited from making a copy of his product or trademark.

Meanwhile, Analiza Perez of the Product Design and Development Center of the Philippines informed participants of the product design trends, stressing their need to be updated on the new labeling designs to make their products more attractive to consumers.

“Having a good product design improves the marketability of your product and making it more competitive in a very tight-competition market,” Perez said.

After these sessions, all government offices were broken up according to the four components of the SME Core which specifically address the needs of the SMEs.

These components are access to financing component, market component, productivity and efficiency component, and the business investment enabling environment Component.

The week-long activity will also be going to Dipolog City and Ipil, Zamboanga Sibugay Province. Another caravan will also be conducted in Isabela City, Basilan on July 17. (JPA/MVC/PIA9-ZBST)