Union Steel Minister Chaudhary Birender Singh mentioned Chhattisgarh as one of the four States where Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV) route has been adopted by the Central Government for creation of Greenfield steel capacity in May 2015 in a press conference on achievements of the Steel Ministry during three years of NDA Government in New Delhi on Wednesday, officials informed.
The Process for the same was initiated in four states of Chhattisgarh, Odisha, for creation of Greenfield steel capacity Jharkhand and Karnataka, he stated.
He said that the three Steel Processing Units, Jagdishpur in UP, Bettiah in Bihar and Kangra in Himachal Pradesh are going to be operationalized within the next one year. This involves an investment of Rs. 500 crores. These units will produce value-added products like crash barriers, black pipes, TMT bars or GC sheets.
Talking of Zero Waste Production, the Steel Minister said that a 120 MW power plant was inaugurated in April 2017 at RINl Vishakhapatnam using the waste gases of the steel plant.
The Huge Fine dumps, waste slag, slime etc. from steel plants need to be utilized by using innovative techniques for Pelletisation of fines, slag-cement for slag towards a Clean & Green Steel Sector in India, he said.
The Ministry of Steel and UNDP have worked for energy conservation in 300 secondary steel units. Plans are to upscale to 1000 secondary steel units. This would reduce CO2 emissions, roughly equal to taking all passenger cars off Delhi’s roads, Chaudhary Singh added.
Singh said that Steel industry needs to go for a paradigm shift and move from semi-finished/crude steel to value-added steel. This will lead to better margins and improve competitiveness. “We are hopeful that SAIl & Arcelor Mittal would soon formalize the Joint Venture for production of automotive-grade steel. This will be a big step-forward under the Prime Minister’s Make in India Programme” he added.
Enlisting new Schemes for Secondary Steel Producers in 2017-18, he said that the steel ministry will rate the ranking of Top-50 Secondary Steel/Smart Producers and awards will for best performing plants in secondary steel sector solely on the criterion of their products of BIS standards and cost effectiveness, he said.
The Minister also announced the institution of Best Steel Structures Awards for best steel structures in PMAY (Rural and Urban), building projects, and roads made with steel reinforced cement concrete and other extraordinary structures using steel in abundance.
Singh said that the GST regime is good for Steel Team as Goods & Services Tax Rates and Slabs for raw materials like iron ore, manganese, coal etc. is in the bracket of 5 %. Semi-finished and unfinished goods is in 18 % bracket. Steel industry will see a reduction in the input cost for steel making with the GST implementation.
The Minister of State in the Ministry of Steel Vishnu Deo Sai, Dr. Aruna Sharma, Secretary Steel, and Senior Officials from the Ministry & the Steel PSUs were present on the occasion.
Notably, pursuing a clear agenda of growth, the Ministry of Steel has had many firsts to its credit. In the year 2015, India became the third largest producer of steel in the world. Recent data shows that India is now looking at positioning itself as the second largest in the very near future.
In the last three years, there has been capacity addition at a steady CAGR of about 7%. There has also been an improvement in the overall capacity utilization.
Another strategic push for the steel industry has been the policy to provide preference to Domestically Manufactured Iron & Steel Products (DMI&SP) in government procurements. This will not just provide a level playing field to the domestic steel industry but will also promote development of domestic steel Industry. Besides, it will also reduce the inclination to use, low quality and low cost imported steel in Government funded projects.