Business Daily from THE HINDU group of publications
Thursday, Jul 06, 2006
Business Daily from THE HINDU group of publications Thursday, Jul 06, 2006 |
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Railways Industry & Economy - Non-conventional Energy Agri-Biz & Commodities - Plantations Rlys reworking norms for commercial jatropha Mamuni Das
New Delhi , July 5 With an aim to attract private sector for jatropha curcas plantation, the Indian Railways is likely to ease the revenue sharing norms of the present commercial plantation policy. It has engaged a consultant that would develop a `market-friendly' agreement framework for joint ventures in commercial plantation of jatropha. Jatropha is an environment-friendly oilseed plant, which is used to produce bio-diesel. The Railways has successfully experimented running locomotives using jatropha-oil blended diesel. As per the present commercial plantation policy, the Railways enters into a joint venture agreement with the private player, wherein it provides land on lease for 15 years and the private player invests in jatropha saplings and maintains the plantation. The joint venture is based on a 50:50 revenue share basis, subject to a commitment of minimum level of payment to the Railways from the private player for the entire period. However, the present policy conditions have been perceived to be quite stringent. Thus, the Railways is trying to work upon a "market-friendly" agreement for commercial plantation, for developing which a Delhi-based consultant, Grow Diesel Ventures, is providing advisory services. The new policy is likely to bring down the floor level of revenue sharing considerably. At present, there are four sites where the Railways has initiated jatropha plantation based on joint venture — three under the North Eastern Railways and one under Southern Railway.
Target set
The Railways has set a target of planting 72 lakh jatropha saplings in 2006-07, up from 61 lakh in the previous fiscal. Apart from commercial plantation through joint ventures, the Railways also plants jatropha through departmental plantations. In departmental plantations, the Railways usually pays contractors to plant jatropha saplings and maintain them for two-three years. Since the plantation sites are under various zonal Railways, the Ministry is trying to develop a common standardised agreement based on which zonal Railways can enter into joint ventures with the private sector. The Railways is working on a plan to utilise the arid and semi-arid surplus land belonging to the organisation outside the station areas for planting jatropha trees for generating bio-diesel for captive consumption. The Southern and Northern Railways have already run trains on bio-diesel blended fuel.
More Stories on : Railways | Non-conventional Energy | Plantations
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