E-commerce giant Amazon on Thursday launched its first Digital Kendra in Gujarat's Surat. Referred to as 'brick and mortar resource centres', Digital Kendra will provide micro small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) the opportunity to learn about the benefits of eCommerce and avail a range of third party services such as shipping and logistics support, cataloguing assistance, digital marketing services, GST and taxation support to kick start their journey towards being digital entrepreneurs.

The seller base was new to digital, they didn't have the skills to go online yet and on the customer side, the majority were using mobile phones to access the internet for the first time, and transactions are primarily cash," he said.

He also noted that Gujarat is a manufacturing powerhouse for auto, auto components, textiles, gems, jewelry, ceramics, and many other sectors and that Surat is one of the key MSME hubs in the state."So, we have set up the first Amazon Digital Kendra is one of the most important MSME clusters and will cater to thousands of MSMEs located in and around the city. The state has been a key geography for us and we have made significant investments in the state," he highlighted.

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Pointing out that more than one lakh sellers from Gujarat, including artisans, weavers, local offline stores, and other sellers, sell to customers in the country as well as other parts of the world, Agarwal exuded hope that by providing the right technology tools, the MSME sector in the state will become an even stronger contributor to the economic growth of the country.