The Hindu Business Line : Naidu sees scope for pact with Israelis in farm sector

THE Chief Minister, Mr N. Chandrababu Naidu, on Friday said that the State and the Israeli agricultural experts saw several areas of cooperation, particularly agri-food processing, drip and high-pressure irrigation.

Speaking to newspersons after a trip to Italy and Israel, he said that companies like the Tahal group, BHC, and Netafa, had evinced interest to partner local companies and explore ways to establish their units in the State.

In addition, Weizman Institute, a leader in incubating firms in life sciences, will collaborate with the State to establish an institute.

"We are also exploring the possibility of benefiting from the Desert Reclamation Project based in Israel. This will be taken up as a pilot in three regions of the State," he added.

"For instance, in drought-prone areas such as Anantapur, we can explore alternative means of development, which could bring long-term benefits to the region."

Apart from these initiatives, the State is also at advanced stage of exploring the possibility of bringing Israeli experts and agriculture and food processing related companies to Hyderabad for an annual event.

This event is aimed at showcasing their best practices and products and also to forge long-term strategic ties between Indian and Israeli technology companies.

With regard to the visit to Italy, particularly to woo the Formula One Holding to locate a racetrack in Hyderabad, Mr Naidu said that Mr Bernie Ecclestone, Chairman of Formula One Holdings, has agreed to visit Hyderabad during the forthcoming Afro-Asian Games.

Along with Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Maharashtra have also evinced interest in attracting the Formula One Holding.

"We are quite optimistic and hopeful of being able to attract such a huge project as this has the potential to bring in a big spin-off affect to the State in terms of other related areas such as tourism and hospitality and create about one lakh jobs."

On whether the State's perseverance to attract Formula One was misdirected, Mr Naidu said that the bid to woo them was well-thought.

Drawing a parallel with opposition to the Indian School of Business, Mr Naidu said, "When big projects like this materialise, we can expect a cascading affect. Therefore, there need not be concerns about wrong priorities."

He is set to call on his Karnataka counterpart, Mr S.M. Krishna, on Saturday to request him to release 50 TMC of water from Krishna river to help the State get over the severe crisis. "We have begun work on cloud seeding."

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