MSME parks set to industrialise Andhra Pradesh big time, says Minister Kondapalli Srinivas 

MSME parks set to industrialise Andhra Pradesh big time, says Minister Kondapalli Srinivas. The government is striving to attract entrepreneurs to invest in the State by offering them tailor-made incentives and extending the required support, and the efforts are paying off, he says.

Andhra Pradesh had lost the opportunity of entrepreneurship post bifurcation as most of the sector-specific Industrial Parks (IPs) built in the unified State were concentrated in and around Hyderabad, and a vast majority of the entrepreneurs, too, stayed back.

Now, the Government of Andhra Pradesh is striving to attract those entrepreneurs to invest in the State by offering them tailor-made incentives and extending the required support.

“The efforts are paying off as quite a good number of companies, the Micro, Small & Medium Enterprises (MSMEs), are coming forward to set up their units in the State, for which the government is extending all assistance,” says Andhra Pradesh Minister for MSMEs Kondapalli Srinivas.

In an exclusive interaction with The Hindu  here on Thursday, Mr. Srinivas said the State was endowed with rich natural resources and human capital needed for industries to thrive, but right now there was not much motivation for various reasons, mainly due to the impact of bifurcation. The State had to restart everything because of bifurcation, and it obviously hit the MSME sector hard.

“Nevertheless, the government has set an ambitious target to develop an Industrial Park (IP) and a flatted factory in each one of the 175 Assembly constituencies in a phased manner, for which three models have been put forth,” he said.

Under the first one, private lands would be developed by private parties, who would have the liberty to sell, or lease the plots. The government would incentivise the development cost. The government lands would be developed by private partners in the second model and the third one would have a mix of government and private lands for development by private partners.

Already, 11 IPs were inaugurated, tenders were being called for 39 parks and 50 parks were in the planning stage. The target was to complete all the 175 IPs in two years, said Mr. Srinivas, while sounding confident that it would be achieved.