Northern Region Confederation of Indian Industries (CII) aims to work in the direction of attracting greater share of investments in 2011-12. “Many of the northern states have progressive policy environment and infrastructure is improving too. What is now required is proper implementation of the policies”, said Vijay Thadani , newly elected NIIT Northern Region Chairman and CII CEO.
A Report on the Investment Climate in Northern States of India was also released on the occassion that contains various facets of investment climate in the region. Expressing that the region has not received a proportionate share of investments, Thandani elaborated that in knowledge economy, availability of skilled people is a prerequisite for attracting investments. He announced that CII would be setting up four Centres of Excellence on Skills in the region, each catering to a set of specific trades. He also announced setting up of University – Industry Partnerships on the lines of the ongoing initiatives at the Delhi University and the Punjab Technical University. Scope of these partnerships would include setting up of finishing schools for students, providing research opportunities to faculty and assisting in curriculum upgradation. “We plan to set up one partnership each in Chandigarh, Punjab, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan and Uttarakhand.”
On the lines of the Skills Development Centre at Parwanoo, CII will also come up with a technology enabled regional centre of excellence on skill development at Bhiwadi. The centre will act as a repository of industry certified curriculum for specific trades, will run the training programmes and will provide services such as assessment and certification, he informed. With about 86 per cent of membership being Micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs), thrust will be to help them develop access to knowledge, resources and markets by starting mentoring services for MSMEs by large companies and special leadership talks to create vision for transitioning into large companies. For this, “CII will set up a MSME Help Desk at CII NR headquarters, to provide expert advice to MSMEs on operational, marketing & strategic and legal issues,” announced the chairman.
In continuation to our existing MoUs with Australia and Scotland, for bilateral trade, Thadani informed that CII will explore newer markets in Singapore, Malaysia, China, Indonesia and some of the other Asian countries through international missions for learning and business development. For this CII would undertake a Survey to determine international business markets our members want to access, shared Thadani.
Announcing the Tax Advisory desk at Chandigarh, to resolve the membership tax enquiries, the chairman also touched upon the issue of Goods and Services Tax (GST). “Lack of consensus amongst the state governments is the major hurdle and one of our prime task this year would be to to play a proactive role in bringing state governments on board,” told Thadani. In addition to tax advocacy work, we are also focusing on creating a body of knowledge through our series of publications “talking north” which focuses on benchmarking the progress of Northern Region, he further informed.
Speaking about the critical area of Energy Efficiency, he explained CIIs participation in consultative process through out the region, as power tarrifs impact industry significantly. Proposing to focus on water audits and awareness sessions on Rain Water Harvesting and Zero Water Discharge, Thadani informed about the availability of expertise at Water institute at Jaipur, now functional.
