• The artisans have been supported in the traditional segments of muslin, khadi, coir, handicraft, handlooms, wood craft, leather, pottery, carpet weaving, bamboo, agro processing, tea, etc.  
  
• The Ministry of MSME is implementing a Scheme of Fund for Regeneration of Traditional Industries (SFURTI) with a view to organize traditional industries and artisans into clusters to make them competitive and increase their income.
  
• These clusters have been inaugurated in the States of Andhra Pradesh, Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Haryana, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Kerala, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Manipur, Nagaland, Odisha, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal.

Background

• As on date, there are 371 numbers of Clusters which have are being funded by the Ministry, supporting 2.18 lakh artisans with a total Government assistance of Rs. 888 cr. 
• More than Rs.708 crore has been the budgetary allocation under the scheme, of which more than Rs.567 crore has been released for the implementation of the scheme so far.
• These clusters are spread all over the country covering 248 districts. The Ministry aims to support at least 1 cluster in each district in the coming period.
• Under the Scheme, the Ministry supports various interventions including setting up of infrastructure through Common Facility Centers (CFCs), procurement of new machineries, creating raw material banks, design intervention, improved packaging, improvement of marketing Infrastructure, improved skills and capacity development through training and exposure visits, etc.