Andhra Pradesh chief minister K Rosaiah on Sunday asked major industries minister Kanna Lakshminaranyana to expedite the preparation of the state’s new industrial investment promotion policy for 2010-15.
While evolving the policy, the chief minister said, the industries department needed to focus on redressing regional imbalances and ensuring that the state’s resources are used to maximum extent.
“Emphasis should be laid on medium and small scale industries that have the potential of generating maximum employment. At the same time, priority should be given to entrepreneurs who come forward to set up industries in rural and backward areas in the three regions of the state – Telangana, coastal Andhra and Rayalaseema,” Rosaiah said.
The chief minister unveiled the road map for the new industrial policy, which incorporates goals like raising the contribution of manufacturing sector to the gross state domestic product (GSDP) to 17 per cent (as against the current level of 11 per cent), achieving enhanced annual growth rate of the manufacturing sector from 12 per cent to 15 per cent and ensuring investments to a level of Rs 12,000-15,000 crore every year.
Creation of 500,000 jobs a year (400,000 in the micro, small and medium enterprises and 100,000 in large industries), increasing the share of the MSME sector to around 60 per cent (with the sector’s share in GSDP to be around 10 per cent) and double the existing food processing capacity from the current 10 per cent to 12 per cent would form the other highlights of the new policy.
The chief minister also instructed the officials to strive hard to utilise the International Investment Summit, slated to be held in Hyderabad this March, basically to attract investments in the petrochemical and petroleum sector in Kakinada and Visakhapatnam and Fab City in Hyderabad. “Special focus should be given while preparing a blueprint to attract IT industries to Tier-II cities like Warangal, Vijayawada and Tirupati,” the chief minister added.
