The Bengal government is working on three polices to draw investors to the state. These include policies on incentives, export promotion and maritime trade.
At an interactive session on bilateral trade relations between India and Japan organised by the Merchants’ Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Srikanth, an officer on special duty to the commerce, industries and enterprise department of the state government, said the three policies were being worked out and would be ready in a few months.
Srikanth’s response followed an observation by Masayuki Taga, the consul-general of Japan, on the rising competition among Indian states to attract global investments.
Taga said there was a lot of interest from the southern states of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana as well as Maharashtra, Gujarat and even Odisha towards attracting Japanese investments. Investors look at incentives and infrastructure as the key factors.
According to government sources, the need for a comprehensive policy stems from different incentives which are being offered to various sectors at present. For instance, incentives for the small and medium enterprises sector are different from those offered to large industry or the IT sector. The state government also has a scheme for power intensive units.
“Incentives are key to attracting new investments and it is a welcome move to revisit the incentive policies, especially at a time the state has progressed in the ease of doing business,” an industry source said.
While there are some common incentives such as capital investment subsidy, interest subsidy and the waiver of electricity duty, the government would also have to take into consideration the different requirements of different industries.
Meanwhile Taga said even as Japan is the third-largest country in the list of FDI inflows into India after Mauritius and Singapore, the bilateral trade is relatively small at present.
Source: The Telegraph
