*Associate Professor, Kousali Institute of Management Studies, KU-Dharwad, Karnataka, India
**Research Scholar, Kousali Institute of Management Studies, KU-Dharwad, Karnataka, India
Online published on 27 February, 2017.
This is an attempt made towards assessing the Level of Awareness about Cluster Development programme (CDP) amongst SME owners of Gadag Districts, the existing literatures and success stories shows that Clusterization is an effective tool to alleviate poverty, enlarge production base and redress economic imbalances. The literature also shows that there is large amount of scope for the Clusterization in all dimensions. Structured interview schedule is used to collect the data from the SME owners of Gadag district, all the 5 Talukas has been given equal importance and 20 SMEs are selected by convenience sampling method from each Talukas. 1st Hypotheses reveals that there is a low level of awareness about Cluster Development Programme amongst SME owners of Gadag District. 96% of the SME owners of Gadag District were not aware about the CDP; only 14 firms were registered with (District Industrial Centre) DIC, out of these only 4 firms were aware about the CDP. Further 70 firms are interested in working in groups. 2nd Hypotheses is tested with Chi-Square, null hypothesis is rejected, this means there is a significant relationship between registration of the business unit and awareness about CDP. We can conclude that registration of SME units is very essential & to be aware of the benefits given to SMEs by Government one should be continuously in touch with the DIC.
Cluster Development Programme, Clusterization, Awareness, District Industrial Centre, SMEs, Small Scale Industries
