Odisha government plans to launch a unified portal which would streamline all approvals and disbursement of incentives to downstream units in the metal sector, said Hemant Sharma, Principal Secretary, Industries, at a virtual round table on Investment Opportunities in metal sector in Odisha organised by the state government and FICCI.

The state government is keen to partner with FICCI to further deliberate on the incentives to be given to the alloy steel segment to enhance the sector’s participation in the state, he said.

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“The state has built up a good ecosystem for the metal industry and we can similarly build an ecosystem for the downstream metal industry. The state is keen to attract investments from industry to set up facilities to boost the beneficiation industry,” he added.

Sanjay Kumar Singh, CMD, IDCO & Commissioner cum Secretary, Skill Development & Technical Education Department, emphasized on the existing and planned industrial infrastructure for the ancillary and downstream industries in Odisha.

“The state has incorporated a corpus fund of Rs 100 crore annually for the aggregation of land and keeping it readily available for industries,” he added.

He said that land availability is a huge asset for the state of Odisha. IDCO has planned to take up development of three new metal downstream clusters at strategic locations of Angul, Jharsuguda and Kalinga Nagar, providing end-to-end facilities.

Odisha offers significant investment opportunities for downstream units in the Aluminium sector. The state, he said, has 56 percent of Aluminium smelting capacity of India with large bauxite reserves.

The state is planning to set up industrial clusters at Paradeep, Ganjam and Bhadrak, offering investment opportunities for ancillary & downstream units in the metal sector, added Singh.

Sanjeeb Kumar Mishra, OSD, Industries Department and Dr Nitin B Jawale, MD, IPICOL highlighted the policies, incentives and facilitation mechanism for ancillary and downstream industries in the state.

Satish Pai, Chair, FICCI Non-Ferrous Metals Committee & MD, Hindalco Ltd highlighted that Odisha has been growing at a rate of CAGR 12.8% between 2015 & 2019. VR Sharma, Rita Singh, Shashi Bhushan Upadhyay, Rahat A Bhatia, Aloke Losalka, Dr Anil Dhawan, Anup Sethi took part in the discussions.