The Union Cabinet on Wednesday approved a World Bank-assisted Rs 6,062 crore funding programme for the small and medium businesses to help improve their access to market and credit.

The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA), chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, approved the Rs 6,062.45 crore or USD 808 million 'Raising and Accelerating MSM Performance' (RAMP) for the micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs), an official release said.RAMP will commence in FY23, it said.

Of the total outlay under the programme, Rs 3,750 crore (USD 500 million) will come from World Bank loan, and the remaining Rs 2,312.45 crore will be funded by the central government.

RAMP will work under the Ministry of MSME (MoMSME) towards resilience and recovery interventions after the coronavirus disease.

"The programme aims at improving access to market and credit, strengthening institutions and governance at the Centre and state, improving Centre-state linkages and partnerships, addressing issues of delayed payments and greening of MSMEs. In addition to building the MoMSME's capacity at the national level, the RAMP programme will seek to scale up implementation capacity and MSME coverage in states," the release said.

The government formulated and proposed RAMP for strengthening MSMEs in line with the recommendations of the UK Sinha committee, KV Kamath committee and the  Economic Advisory Council of the Prime Minister (EAC-PM).

 RAMP programme with impacts across the country will directly or indirectly benefit all 6.3 crore enterprises under the MSME category.

 A total of 5,55,000 MSMEs are specifically targeted for enhanced performance. In addition, expansion of target market to include service sectors and increase of about 70,500 women MSMEs is envisaged, the release said.