SHILLONG, Jan 16: Meghalaya has received an accolade of “Top Performer State” at the National Startup Awards, 2022 held as part of the National Startup Day celebrations on Tuesday.
A government statement said this success is a culmination of Chief Minister Conrad K Sangma’s vision and leadership.
According to the statement, Sangma, being an entrepreneur himself, took a set of innovative steps to convert the state’s sizable young population into job creators instead of jobseekers.
The statement said he spearheaded efforts which led to the formulation of Meghalaya Startup Policy 2018 which was introduced with the objective of making the state “India’s leading startup hub by 2023”.
In pursuit of that target, the state government launched the PRIME (Promotion & Incubation of Market-driven Enterprises) program in 2020 for building a startup ecosystem. PRIME has been instrumental in catalysing the state’s startup revolution.
Chief Minister’s E-Champion Challenge and the PRIME Incubation program are cornerstones of this effort. It is a recurring annual event through which promising youngsters are selected for pitching startup ideas in front of industry experts, successful entrepreneurs and government officials.
The program currently supports about 5,500 entrepreneurs and over 200 startups. Many of these received seed funding and zero interest scale up loans.
A large number of incubation centres called ‘PRIME Hubs’ are being set up where new entrepreneurs are offered state-of-the-art workspace and supportive infrastructure for processing, packaging and value addition activities. These PRIME Hubs also facilitate market access for the entrepreneurs to realize premium prices for their products in local and overseas markets.
Meghalaya has been witnessing the success of these market linkage strategies for over a year now. In December last year, a large consignment of GI-tagged Khasi mandarins was sold during the three-day ‘Zest Fest’ held at Bangalore. Earlier in the year, world famous Kew Pineapples and Lakadong Turmeric from the state were exported to premium retail outlets in the Middle East.
Recognising Meghalaya’s matrilineal society, 20% of the funding support offered under PRIME is reserved exclusively for women entrepreneurs. A large number of women have benefited from this support and are running thriving businesses in traditional handloom and other innovative trades.
