ITC plans Rs 15,000 cr investment

ITC would be investing Rs 14-15,000 crore in the next few years, Chairman Y C Deveshwar said at the company's annual general meeting here today.

The aim was to achieve leadership status in all its businesses, he told shareholders of the company at the meeting today.

In the last decade, shareholders' returns, measured in terms of increase in market capitalisation and dividends, grew at a compound rate of over 30 per cent per annum, he pointed out.

With a big focus on becoming green, the group became a 'water-positive' and 'carbon-positive' corporation by undertaking several energy conservation measures, usage of carbon neutral fuel and carbon sequestration through large-scale agri-forestry programmes and was making rapid strides towards attaining 'zero solid waste' status.

Its hotels division may soon unveil an aggressive expansion plan with high quality hotels in Bangalore and Chennai.

The paperboards business may also undergo an expansion to service the growing demand for high quality pulp-based products, including a range of coated and uncoated papers.

The ITC e-choupal had 10 centres already operational, while nine were in an advanced stage of completion and its rural retailing initiative will be scaled up by another 40 Choupal Saagars in the next 12-18 months.

The packaged foods business drew upon the unique sourcing capability of the ITC e-choupal, the cuisine expertise of ITC Welcomgroup, the innovation capacity resident in the ITC R&D Centre and the traditional strengths of branding, trade marketing and distribution to provide distinctive sources of competitive advantage in the marketplace, he said.

While the synergising of in-house skills is contributing to the rapid growth of the new FMCG businesses, such growth in turn has also spurred new opportunities for the other businesses such as foods, development and pilot marketing of organic agri inputs for farmers.

The company was keen to take the lead to involve its consumers as partners in progress, he added.

Deveshwar said investment of over Rs 6,000 crore towards enhancing competitiveness of its businesses has led to direct employment for 28,000 people across the group and indirect employment across the value chain for nearly 5 million people.

Over the next 5-7 years, ITC intends to create nearly 6,300 water harvesting structures and thereby extend critical irrigation to more than 50,000 hectares of rainfed arable land.