JICA may offer consultancy services to Andhra Pradesh's Greenfield capital city

HYDERABAD: The Japanese government agency Japan International Cooperation Agency ( JICA) has evinced interest to offer consultancy services for the Greenfield capital city of Andhra Pradesh.

JICA has also expressed keenness to financing power projects coming up in Chennai-Bangalore industrial corridor and Krishnapatnam Industrial Park on India’s east coast.

Interacting with the visiting AP chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu in Japan on Monday, the JICA senior vice president Domichi Hidaeki said several Japanese firms were interested in AP. He said a good part of $35 billion worth investments that Japan had committed to India during the summit meeting between India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Japanese counterpart Shinzo Abe could go into AP.

"We are also prepared to finance Japanese and Indian companies to invest in India," said Hidaeki.

Estimating the investment requirements of Andhra’s Greenfield capital city at $50 billion over the next 15 years, Naidu urged JICA to prepare an action plan involving irrigation, infrastructure and capital city.

Yokohama Port has agreed to prepare a master plan for collaboration with AP ports like Kakinada, Krishnapatnam and Visakhapatnam.

During the day, Naidu signed MoUs with Sumitomo in the areas of agriculture, energy, food processing and capital development, and interacted with top management representatives of Fuji Electric, Mitsubishi, Mayekawa, Yokohama Port and Sumitomo.

Koichi Yajima, executive managing director of Japan Bank of International Cooperation (JBIC), said their latest global survey indicated rising investor sentiment in favour of India. The JBIC executive said SoftBank was preparing to invest in Andhra’s solar power sector.

Fuji Electric, which had agreed to set up a smart grid project near Vijayawada on a pilot basis, has submitted the feasibility report on the project. Fuji’s representative director Yoshio Okuno said the company was interested in setting up smart grid projects across the state and partner with AP to offer consultancy services to other Indian states.

Representatives of Sumitomo Corporation, which had signed memorandum of understanding with the AP government last November for power project at Bhavanapadu, said feasibility and preliminary studies were completed on the project.

Sumitomo has also expressed interest to offer services to AP to increase agricultural yields, apart from participating in the capital city development in the areas of sewerage treatment, water management, traffic signals and traffic plan.