Vice-President M. Venkaiah Naidu on Saturday said Andhra Pradesh was emerging as a favourite destination for investments due to the stability and the ability of the leadership at the Centre and in the State.
He was speaking after inaugurating the three-day CII Partnership Summit and the Sunrise Andhra Pradesh Investment Meet here at the sprawling APIIC grounds at the Harbour Park. This was the third summit being held in a row in the city.
Lauding the visionary leadership of Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu, the Vice-President said with enormous opportunities for investors with a 974-km long coastline, the second largest after Gujarat, there was plenty of scope for investment in agriculture, food processing industries, electronics, seafood and infrastructure.
Mr. Venkaiah Naidu said India had emerged as a strong economy due to the pro-active policies of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and said as per projections, the country was poised to become $10-trillion economy with an average income of $5,000 in 10 to 15 years.
Describing the demonetisation and the rolling out of the GST regime as revolutionary decisions, he said now the bank lending rates had come down with substantial increase in the filing of the Income-Tax returns. “All States including AP have extended their cooperation for implementation of these decisions.”
Mr. Chandrababu Naidu gave details of the steps being taken for real-time governance and ease of doing business to create conducive climate for investors and said AP was poised to emerge among the top three performing States by 2022 and No. 1 State by 2029 and the best investment destination by 2050.
“AP is the only State to maintain double digit growth for the third consecutive year. During the first half of 2017-18, we have achieved 11.37% growth rate. The industrial corridors proposed between Visakhapatnam and Chennai and Bengaluru and Chennai will further raise the growth rate,” he said.
He said automobiles, textiles, healthcare, engineering, IT, food processing industries, aerospace and defence had been identified as thrust areas.
In his keynote address, Union Minister for Commerce and Industry Suresh Prabhu said after the difficulties faced due to the bifurcation, AP was performing very well on all fronts. It had emerged as the fastest growing State and in the New India campaign launched by the Prime Minister, it would continue to have an important role to play.
He said the vision adopted by the Prime Minister and the Chief Minister would make AP a “new and vibrant State”.
Saying exports and value addition of various products would generate a lot of revenue and jobs, he advised AP to lay emphasis not only on production but also designing of various products.
Union Civil Aviation Minister P. Ashok Gajapathi Raju, CII president Shobana Kamineni, Director General Chandrajit Banerjee, Adani Group Chairman Gautam Adani and Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion Secretary Ramesh Abhishek were present.
