 "Odisha quickens steps to woo overseas investors")
As part of its endeavour to promote Odisha in overseas destinations, the state government is planning to conduct roadshows in the UK and Israel in first week of February. The state delegation would also participate in the grand ‘Make in India Week’ being hosted by Centre next month to showcase Odisha’s potential to prospective investors.
“Our focus at these roadshows would be to pull investors to Odisha that offers a plethora of opportunities. We have also come out with a new industrial policy statement that provides incentives and aims to ease business procedures”, said a senior government official.
Odisha has identified five thrust sectors in its latest Industrial Policy Resolution (IPR) 2015- agriculture & food processing, chemicals & petrochemicals, electronics, IT & ITes, textiles and downstream & ancillary industries. It has targeted to draw fresh investments worth Rs 1.73 lakh crore by 2019 that promises to generate 330,000 new jobs.
The state currently ranks seventh among all states on ‘Ease of Doing Business’ parameter. It aims to improve its slot to the third position in the next round of ranking.
To ease business processes, the state government has rolled out a suite of reforms.
There is one single TIN (Taxpayer Identification Number) for all kinds of taxes. The entire commercial tax machinery has been computerised. The government is soon going to have a centralised inspection framework.
Inspectors from different departments will go for inspection together and post their reports online within 48 hours. A decision will soon be taken for roll out of online combined application form (CAF). A state level facilitation cell has been formed to clear investments in three to seven days.
Inspectors from different departments will go for inspection together and post their reports online within 48 hours. A decision will soon be taken for roll out of online combined application form (CAF). A state level facilitation cell has been formed to clear investments in three to seven days.
The SLFC has categorised companies in two broad categories- green and non-green. The green category largely comprises agri-based industries, food-processing, cottage industries, textiles, light engineering, chemicals, building materials, and consumer goods.
Under the new arrangement, SLFC will provide clearances to green category projects within 15 days. All other industrial projects placed under the non-green category would receive approvals within 30 days.