The Hindu Business Line : SEZs put in execution mode

Of the 237 special economic zones (SEZs) awarded by the Centre, Andhra Pradesh has bagged 54. By getting them into execution mode soon, the State is hopeful that they would trigger its economy.

Interestingly, while about half of them are IT SEZs, the others are multi-product, textile, leather, building, pharma and biotech among others.

Besides, the State expects these SEZs would help create lakhs of jobs in the next few years. Forty-five of them have received formal approvals and nine in-principle approvals.

"Of the 54, 11 would be taken up by the Government, while the rest would come up in the private sector," Dr J. Geeta Reddy, Minister for Major Industries, Exports, Sugar and Tourism, told Business Line.

5 LAKH JOBS

Talking on the SEZs' capacity to generate employment, she said the zones had already resulted in creation of five lakh jobs. "These zones offer a great employment potential. We estimate that the zones would ultimately create 14 lakh jobs by 2010," she said.

"The Adidas SEZ at Tada (Nellore) district would provide jobs to 30,000 people and the one proposed by Brandix near Visakhapatnam would generate 60,000 jobs. The exclusive SEZ for gems and jewellery, which is coming near Hyderabad, promises to create 10,00 jobs. Most import thing is, women would benefit more," the Minister said.

Reacting to the criticism on the allotment of land for the zones, the Minister said the Government would try its best to avoid fertile land.

"We will allot dry and barren land for the zones. Of the 13,000 acres allotted for SEZs, only 920 acres are cultivable," she said. "A small State like Haryana has acquired one lakh acres. Maharashtra too acquired 72,000 acres," she said.

She also pointed out that the total land allotted to the zones was just a fraction of the total arable land of 300 lakh acres in the State. The Minister also discounted the apprehensions that some developers could misuse the lands for real estate activity. "It is a misconception and misunderstanding of the Act. The Act doesn't allow the developers to use the land for other activity. They can lease the land for companies only to take up the earmarked work," she asserted.

The Andhra Pradesh Industrial Infrastructure Corporation Ltd (APIIC), a nodal agency of the State handling infrastructure, was in the process of initiating work on a multi-product SEZ at Atchutapuram and Rambilli mandals near Visakhapatam, which would be spread over some 5,700 acres. Similar SEZs have been initiated by APIIC in Vizag, Krishna and Ranga Reddy districts of the State.

These multi-product SEZS include Kakinada Seaports Ltd (10,214 acres), Satyavedu Reserve Infra (2,500 acres) and SRF Ltd (2500 acres).

In the IT and ITES sector, the prominent among them include Wipro, Satyam, K. Raheja, CMC Ltd, (TCS) and in the pharma sector, Dr. Reddy's has proposed two SEZs at Medak and Srikakulam, Hetero Drugs and Ramky Pharma both near Vizag.

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