As the number of COVID-19 cases increase in the city, more streets are coming into containment zones and industries fear this can affect production.

C. Sivakumar, president of Coimbatore and Tiruppur District Tiny and Micro Entrepreneurs’ Association, so far industries have not been affected much because of containment measures. “However, I just got a message that two streets in a micro industry cluster were closed. We will need to verify the information and see what the impact will be. There are reports that the containment area restrictions are lifted in five to six days. If there is an industry in that particular street, it will be affected,” he said.

According to R. Ramamurthy, president of Coimbatore District Small Industries’ Association, if there are positive cases in bigger industries, the division where the worker was employed is closed for a day, the entire area is disinfected, and production continues after that. In the case of MSMEs, there have been no complaints so far regarding containment zones.

President of Coimbatore SIDCO Industrial Estate Manufacturers’ Welfare Association, P. Nallathambi, said only the particular street where a positive case is reported is closed down. Worker movement from that area is affected and also because of lack of buses.

J. James, president of Tamil Nadu Association of Cottage and Tiny Enterprises, said if a micro industry owner is affected, the unit’s operations come to a standstill for nearly a month. This is because of the mandatory quarantine after the treatment. Most of the micro units are managed by a single person. The workers can only operate the machinery with the raw materials available. There will be no one to co-ordinate with customers or the raw material suppliers. In such situations, the government should come forward and support the micro units.

Several industries were already affected before the COVID spread because of economic slowdown. With the pandemic, the financial stress has only increased for the MSMEs. The government should come out with uniform guidelines regarding quarantine and containment area restrictions so that MSMEs are not affected, he said.