The Hindu Business Line : No going back on industrialisation: Buddhadeb

Kolkata, Jan. 22 Addressing the inaugural session of the 107th Annual General Meeting of Bharat Chamber of Commerce here on Tuesday, the West Bengal Chief Minister, Mr Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, said while gains on the agriculture front would need to be further consolidated, there was no looking back on industrialisation of the State.

Admitting that despite successes in agriculture there were problems pertaining to irrigation, non availability of high quality seeds, bio-fertiliser etc that needed urgent attention, the Chief Minister said both consolidation in agriculture and industrialisation must go hand in hand.

He said following the submission of the State Agriculture Commission’s interim report recently, there was a need to look at problems of agriculture seriously to raise farm productivity in a big way. “There is need for reorientation in agriculture.”

Market mechanism

Calling for an effective market mechanism to take the food-processing sector forward, Mr Bhattacharjee said interests of both farmers and consumers have to be protected.

“We need to modernise the fresh vegetable markets in the city, and Indian private companies should be allowed to come forward and participate in this process,” he pointed out. Elaborating on the theme of ‘West Bengal: a prime FDI destination”, Mr Bhattacharjee conceded that substantial infrastructure development has to take place to attract large FDI into Bengal.

Citing the large on-going infrastructure projects such as modernisation of Kolkata Airport (scheduled for completion by 2010) and the proposed third deep sea port in West Bengal, he said work on the much awaited East-West Kolkata Metro Rail work was likely to begin this year, for which Japanese loan assistance is expected.

Investment proposals

Besides the Singur small car project by the Tatas, the State has also received investment proposals from some auto ancillary units, he added.

Besides the Jindal Group’s mega steel project at Salboni (entailing an investment of around Rs 35,000 crore), proposals for two more steel projects in the backward district of Purulia (in the Raghunanthpur area) have also been received.

Mr Bhattacharjee also stated that the proposed Petroleum, Chemicals Petro- chemicals Investment Region project in West Bengal (one of the four shortlisted States) was very much on cards. He said an expert panel headed by Mr Subir Raha, former ONGC Chairman, was now studying the proposed chemicals hub project at Nayachar Island (near Haldia) in detail.

Earlier, in his address, Mr P.R. Agarwala, president of the Chamber, said West Bengal, being on the fast-track of economic development, now needed to pursue the ‘Look East’ policy of the Centre more aggressively.

Infrastructural support

“This will require further infrastructural support in terms of cold chain linkages for export of the agricultural, horticultural, fisheries and floriculture products of our State.”

“We need to modernise the fresh vegetable markets in the city, and Indian private companies should be allowed to come forward and participate in this process.”

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