Setting up of NIMZs

The Government has granted “in-principle” approval to a total of 16 National Investment and Manufacturing Zones (NIMZs).  Of these, 8 NIMZs are located outside the Delhi-Mumbai Industrial Corridor (DMIC) region. These are: (i)        Nagpur in Maharashtra; (ii)             Tumkur in Karnataka; (iii)           Chittoor in Andhra Pradesh; (iv)            Prakasam in Andhra Pradesh; (v)                     Medak in Telangana; (vi)            Kolar in Karnataka; (vii)         Bidar in Karnataka; and (viii)       Gulbarga in Karnataka.  . Under phase-I of the DMIC project, 8 Investment Regions have also been accorded ‘in-principle’ approval of Government for setting up as NIMZs as per guidelines approved by the Cabinet. These are: i.      Ahmedabad-Dholera Investment Region, Gujarat; ii.   Shendra-Bidkin Industrial Park city near Aurangabad, Maharashtra; iii. Manesar-Bawal Investment Region, Haryana ; iv.  Khushkhera-Bhiwadi-Neemrana Investment Region, Rajasthan; v.    Pithampur-Dhar-Mhow Investment Region, Madhya Pradesh; vi.  Dadri-Noida-Ghaziabad Investment Region, Uttar Pradesh; vii.        Dighi Port Industrial Area, Maharashtra ; and viii. Jodhpur-Pali-Marwar Region in Rajasthan.                    The Government of India has approved a corpus of Rs. 17,500 crore as a Revolving Fund for development of trunk infrastructure in the DMIC region. The Government of Japan has announced their financial support for DMIC project to an extent of US$ 4.5 billion in the first phase for projects with Japanese participation through a mix of Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) and Japan Bank for International Cooperation (JBIC) lending. The National Manufacturing Policy contains dispensations to facilitate manufacturing industry both in the National Investment and Manufacturing Zones (NIMZs) and for manufacturing industry in the country as a whole including wherever manufacturing units are able to organize themselves in clusters as stipulated in the policy. These dispensations include inter-alia rationalization and simplification of business regulations; incentives for technology acquisition and production/adoption of pollution controlling equipment/machines/devices; incentives for skill development initiatives by the private sector; facilitating access to finance for small and medium enterprises; and creation of physical and institutional infrastructure including master planning of NIMZ.   Apart from sixteen NIMZs which have been accorded “in-principle” approval, the Government has received four more proposals for setting up of NIMZ outside the Delhi-Mumbai Industrial Corridor region from Governments of Uttar Pradesh (Two), Gujarat (One) and Orissa (One). The concerned State Governments have been requested for further clarifications/ details about these proposals. Long Term Vision for Making India A Major Player in World Trade It is the endeavour of the Government to make India a major player in the world trade by 2020 with focus on enhancing exports and playing an important role in the international trade bodies. The Foreign Trade Policy (FTP), announced every five years, provides an over arching framework for catalysing India’s exports. The broad principles of FTP are: (i) The Foreign Trade Policy provides policy support for increasing India’s export growth by adopting market diversification and product diversification plans and maintaining a stable policy environment. (ii) The policy also provides framework for duty free import of raw materials and duty free import of capital goods for enhancing manufacturing capacity for exports, after fixing export obligation on the exporters. (iii) One of the guiding principles of FTP is that the taxes should not be exported. Therefore, exporters are granted access to duty free raw material or are provided refund of duties paid in manufacture of exported products. (iv) Providing trade facilitation measures to improve trade environment.