Finance Minister Arun Jaitley has termed micro and small enterprises sector as the backbone of the economy, saying the sector will lead the its current consolidation phase. <br/><br/>Launching CriSidEx, the first sentiment index for MSEs in New Delhi today, Mr Jaitley said, with a number of steps taken there is an increased integration of the sector into the formal economy.<br/><br/>Pointing out that it is one of the largest employers, he said, people not only exhibit their entrepreneurial skills in this sector, and become part of large value chains but then also become job creators in the process. <br/><br/>He said, this is the reason why the bulk of the jobs in manufacturing, trading have been created in this particular sector.<br/><br/>CriSidEx, developed jointly by CRISIL and SIDBI, is a composite index based on a diffusion index of 8 parameters, and measures MSE business sentiment on a negative to positive scale. <br/><br/>The current parametric feedback was captured through a survey of one thousand one hundred MSEs in November and December last year.<br/><br/>The Minister said, the index will be of use to not only individual companies, but also policymakers for bringing-in necessary changes to ensure that the government continues to perform its role as a facilitator.