Emami Paper Mills Ltd, which has set up a 1.32 lakh tonne high-end paper board manufacturing facility at a cost of Rs 1,000 crore at its plant at Balasore in Odisha, has planned to invest further Rs 1,000 crore in the next three years to double the capacity of paper board making.

Aditya Agarwal, Executive Chairman of the company, told a group of visiting journalists that Emami Paper has decided to increase the capacity to 2.6 lakh tonnes in three years with an additional investment of Rs 1,000 crore.

Currently under trial production, the facility would reach 75 per cent capacity utilisation for four-layered paper board next month, he added.

The company, which produced 1.5 lakh tonnes of newsprint and 15,000 tonnes of writing and printing paper annually, has decided to diversify more into paper board making for better margins.

"In boards, we are looking into the possibility of 20 per cent EBIDTA margin," Agarwal said. He said the duty-free import of newsprint depressed the profitability of domestic production. He also indicated that writing and printing paper segment did not hold great prospect.

The multi-layered coated paper boards for packaging would be the focus area of the company in future.

PS Patwari, Executive Director of the company, said domestic demand for paper boards has been growing 15 per cent annually.

"Even though new capacities are slated to be added in the coming years, considering the demand growth, these may not create over capacities", he said. The company expects to have 20 per cent market share in paper boards. Emami Paper would also be exploring the export market.

Agarwal said in 2016-17 at least 60 per cent of the company's revenue would come from paper boards.

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