The Hindu Business Line : AP: Industrial clusters proposal okayed

Plans cleared
Clusters include marine food processing at Bhimavaram in West Godavari district, powerloom at Sircilla in Karimnagar, leather at Bhongir in Nalgonda, precision engineering products in Rangareddy and coir products in West Godavari district

Hyderabad , April 23

The Union Government has cleared five major industrial clusters proposed by the Andhra Pradesh Government, the Union Minister of State for Industry, Dr Ashwani Kumar, has announced.

Addressing newspersons here on Saturday along with the AP Minister for Major Industries, Sugar and Tourism, Dr J. Geeta Reddy, he said these clusters include marine food processing at Bhimavaram in West Godavari district, powerloom at Sircilla in Karimnagar, leather at Bhongir in Nalgonda, precision engineering products in Rangareddy and coir products in West Godavari district.

The Centre had earlier approved two major industrial clusters — pharma at Visakhapatnam and auto components at Vijayawada. It also cleared an Integrated Leather Complex at Nellore with world-class leather laboratory over a land of 415 acres.

The Centre has sanctioned Rs 30 crore for the project, while the State Government would contribute Rs 20 crore.

The Union Minister said the Andhra Pradesh Government has sought concessional finance from Nabard for AP State Financial Corporation, AP Industrial Development Corporation and AP Industrial Infrastructure Development Corporation.

Stating that Nabard is currently providing such concessional finance only to the commercial banks, Dr Kumar said his Ministry would take up the issue with the Union Ministry of Finance since it finds prima facie logic in the request of AP Government for availability of cheaper funds for the industrial growth in the State.

Rs 950-cr corpus

Stating that the Centre has created a corpus of Rs 950 crore for supporting the industrial and technological upgradation of industrial clusters coming up across the country, the Union Minister said plans are on the anvil to further strengthen the corpus keeping in view growing industrial clusters in several States in the country.

Industrial growth

Dr Ashwani Kumar promised to extend all the necessary support to the AP Government in order to boost industrial growth and facilitate establishment of industrial clusters and Special Economic Zones.

Dr Geeta Reddy said the State Government would shortly initiate the process to rope-in a developer for the Integrated Leather Complex at Nellore on the lines of Pharma City project developed by the Ramky group at Visakhapatnam. The State Government has recently pumped in Rs 50 crore as additional equity support to the Corporation, she added.

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