Three lakh square feet of built-up area and vacant plots in an extent of 22 acres are ready for allotment to eligible entrepreneurs for setting up industrial units at the Visakhapatnam Special Economic Zone (VSEZ) at Duvvada.
Known as Visakhapatnam Export Processing Zone, it was developed with state-of-the-art facilities such as high-speed broadband, easy access to highway and ports in 360 acres in 1989 to encourage exports and provide jobs to the locals. At present, the SEZ has four standard design factories with a total built-up area of 6 lakh sft and nine industrial sheds spreading over 90,000 sft and 18 trading sheds of 18,000 sft.
Incentives galore
The zone generates 0.85 MW solar power and the Greater Visakhapatnam Municipal Corporation (GVMC) is taking care of the water requirement of various units.
“Functioning under the Ministry of Commerce and Industry, the SEZ offers a slew of incentives including income tax holiday for five years, free from union activities and all clearances in a time-bound manner under one roof,” Development Commissioner for VSEZ and 100% Export Oriented Units (EoUs) in Andhra Pradesh, Telangana and Chhattisgarh, A.R.M. Reddy told The Hindu on Wednesday.
The VSEZ charges ₹1,200 per square meter for ready-built area and ₹150 per square meter for developed plots.
The facilities are allotted only to eligible applicants subject to fulfilling the guidelines prescribed by the ministry, Mr. Reddy said.
He added that they were initiating measures to take possession of units which had either shut down operations due to legal or financial problems and allot those to eligible entrepreneurs.
Target and turnover
The VSEZ has clocked a turnover of ₹2016 crore in the last fiscal when compared to ₹1,302 crore generated in 2017-18 financial year and it expects to increase the volume of business by 10% this fiscal.
At present, 69 operational units in the SEZ including that of Dr. Reddy’s Lab, Worldwide Diamond, Fleuntgrid, Biomax Fuel and Lee Pharma have provided direct jobs to 5,000 people and indirect employment to nearly 2,000 others. “Of the 110 units allotted space at the zone, 69 are in operation, 22 have turned sick and 10 have shut down their operations or in the process of exiting and nine are under various stages of implementation. The 100% EoUs has registered a total turnover of ₹1,762 crore in Andhra Pradesh and ₹9,078 crore in Telangana in the last financial year,” Mr. Reddy said.
