Tamil Nadu will catch up in the area of chemicals to attract investments with a revamped strategy that includes setting up of a polymer park, systematisation of environment laws that come under the purview of the State and other support measures, the State Industry Secretary, S Krishnan said.

The State will welcome anyone – be it home grown units or companies from outside the State or country – and will extend support in the same manner to all. Because, the State needs to remain competitive to attract investments and create jobs, in particular shop floor jobs, which are mostly given to the people from the State, he said while addressing a seminar on ‘Funding opportunities for chemical industry in Tamil Nadu,’ organised by FICCI here.

Though Tamil Nadu had some early leads in the chemical industry, it needs to catch up as the nature of the chemical industry has changed so much from basic chemicals into petrochemical-based industries. “We are well positioned to do that with four ports and the possibility of using infrastructure to actually get all of that done. There’s a Polymer Park, over 306 acre outside Chennai to make available lands for chemical investments, said Krishnan.

Environment laws

Discussing the environment laws pertaining to the chemical industry, he said the State government was working towards reducing the arbitrariness in the laws and bringing an element of systematisation to the same. “I fully recognise the pain points related to the environmental laws. Not all of it is within our control. There is just one or two levels of clearance which caused the biggest problems. We’ve managed to sort of systematise most of the other elements,” he added.

R Radhakrishna, Chief General Manager-Chennai Circle, State Bank of India stated that the largest public sector bank in the country would be willing to support the chemical industry, not only in respect of those who are already in the trade, but also the newcomers into this industry. “We have a host of products, which are available at the most competitive rates,” he added. Quoting chemical industry statistics, Radhakrishna said that India was becoming a preferred destination for many industries including chemicals as Europe and the US move away from China . “By taking just 2-3 per cent global market share away from China, the Indian chemical industry could double its size. This can happen only if there is an encouragement of the investments through incentives, ease of doing businesses and lowering the risk for the investors,” he added.

Related Topics
comment COMMENT NOW