Providence Industrial Estate |06 April 2016

Minister visits tenants at new business complex

The Minister for Investment, Entrepreneurship Development and Business Innovation, Michael Benstrong, on Monday visited the tenants at the Macro Enterprise Complex (Leve Debrouye building) at Providence.

The aim was to see for himself ongoing developments there after listening to feedbacks from the tenants running or setting up their businesses there.
It was also an opportunity for the ministry to see how it can provide a better service to the occupants.

The minister was accompanied by Marise Berloius, the principal secretary in his ministry; Vic Tirant, chief executive of Industrial Estate Authority, among  other officials.

The building was officially opened last year by President James Michel and its purpose is to provide small and medium enterprises with a place to carry out their businesses.

Many tenants have already started operations in fields as diverse as energy solutions, graphic design, soft furnishing and upholstery, food processing like meat and cake making, accounting, just to name some. But there are also those who are still in preparation stage like partitioning the interior of their offices to better accommodate the type of businesses they want to do.

Minister Benstrong also interacted with them to find out how they are settling down, the concerns and difficulties they are encountering and how to improve services being offered.

“This forms part of the ministry’s endeavour to improve services,” said Minister Benstrong when speaking to the press.

He said one of the pertinent issues that can be improved is solving the problem of strong winds which cause rain to enter the offices.

“We are working with contractors to see how we can rectify this problem, as well as air conditions that need to be upgraded as activities being undertaken in certain premises need a strong cooling system. These are dialogues that we will continue with our tenants,” remarked the minister.

Other issues raised were on the marketing side where the minister suggested linking those small businesses with the website of the Providence Industrial Authority which is planned to be launched soon.

“This is a policy called industrial competitiveness that the ministry has launched. The policy contains a segment which indicates how we can make our small businesses penetrate the community, closer to their customers. We are seeing how we can help them, integrate them with the website to make it more comprehensive so as to make it a ‘win win situation’,” said the minister.

He commended the tenants for respecting areas in the building designated for a particular use.

Minister Benstrong also announced a project on enlarging the road to the entrance of the building to tackle traffic jam. He said this forms part of his ministry’s programme for the complex.

The accompanying photos show Minister Benstrong and his delegation visiting the tenants at the new Providence complex.