For MSMEs to thrive, Quality Council of India must play a key role

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As efforts gain pace to revive demand in an economy ravaged by COVID-19, the Quality Council of India (QCI) should step up to the plate to ensure that concerns over the quality of offerings of micro, small, and medium enterprises (MSMEs) — that together contribute nearly 30 percent to the GDP — do not prove a hurdle in the growth recovery process.

As an organisation with participation from both government and industry, and a mission to lead the quality movement in India, the QCI must assist companies in the MSME space get their quality act right, so that these businesses may continue to prosper in the ‘new normal’ marked by volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity.

Especially in the light of the desire expressed last month by the Union Minister for Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises Nitin Gadkari about raising the MSME segment’s contribution to India’s GDP to 50 percent, and create an additional 50 million new jobs in this arena. Gadkari was speaking at the launch of the Aatmanirbhar Bharat ARISE-Atal New India Challenge. Besides this, historically, most of the 3 million-plus MSMEs in India, which together employ about 110 million people, have often found the going tough in adopting best practises and international quality standards.

The QCI's intervention could go a long way in enabling countless home-grown MSMEs start living and breathing quality, become more competitive on a global scale, attain a position where they can attract a larger number of better-paying customers from within India and overseas, and, also, significantly gain the muscle to create more well-paying jobs.

Concentrating its focus chiefly on the big boys of Indian industry — of whom most would already be quality-conscious and, have the resources to deploy on improving existing quality systems — can never match the sort of positive transformational impact that QCI can have on the operations of MSMEs.

Gadkari also recently expressed intent of raising the MSME contribution from 49 percent to 60 percent of overall exports. This in itself should be a powerful motivator for the QCI to get more involved with this arena.

That is not all. Prior to the pandemic, many Indian businesses could often bank on the country’s large size and population, and low customer awareness levels to get away with products and/or services whose quality often did not merit the prices being charged for the offerings. Now, when customer spend has decreased, companies can no longer get away with the earlier slackness.

In such a setting, the QCI, in addition to driving home the quality message, can help the MSMEs realise that several Indian customers — despite their public posturing about being vocal for local — may not necessarily end up buying or paying a premium for a product whose sole USP is its ‘desi’ tag.

The QCI could make the MSMEs aware that prospective buyers may not always reject a product because the company behind it is foreign and/or may have manufactured the item outside India. In addition to this, the MSMEs must be sensitised to the fact that customers are more likely to choose products that offer a better value proposition.

For any organisation, rarely does an opportunity come around to leave a lasting mark on a key segment of the economy on whose progress depends the realisation of self-reliance (Aatmanirbhar Bharat). This will also help India achieve its long-cherished ambition of being recognised as a developed country.

For the Quality Council of India, a COVID-19-hit MSME arena presently provides that prospect, and one can only hope that it laps up this chance to become a catalyst for change in the best interests of 1.3 billion Indians.

Sumali Moitra is a current affairs commentator. Twitter: @sumalimoitra. Views are personal.