Times of India | 1 month ago | 11-02-2023 | 11:30 am
Panaji: The government is toying with the idea of setting up amusement parks and tourism ventures at industrial estates which are lying vacant and which have not found favour with manufacturing units, said chief minister Pramod Sawant. Sawant, who was addressing the Verna Industries Association on Friday, said that Quitol is one of the industrial estates where not a single manufacturing industry has been set up.“There are two industrial estates where no industry is willing to start, for example Quitol. An amusement park should be allowed to come up. It will generate employment for more than 1,000 people,” said Sawant. “We want either IT, pharma or green industries, and tourism is also an industry.”The chief minister was speaking at the ‘IDC Connect’ initiative started by the Goa Industrial Development Corporation (GIDC).The Quitol Industrial Estate at Quepem was earmarked for a food processing park, but the project never took off. The barren land on the Quitol plateau was temporarily used to host the ministry of defence’s Land, Naval & Internal Homeland Security Systems Exhibition (DefExpo) in 2016.Sawant explained that the government wants to efficiently utilise all industrial land for economic activity, and in line with this thought it is ready to bring in a scheme to regularise unauthorised manufacturing units or allotted plots which have not been utilised.“We are ready to legalise everything if you are ready to pay the fees and allow industrial activity to start. We are ready to charge even 20%. At the end of the day, we want the plots to be utilised,” said Sawant. A day earlier, GIDC chairman Aleixo Reginaldo Lourenco had said that a one-time settlement scheme would be introduced to allow manufacturing units to clear their pending dues and other unpaid fees.Sawant said that a survey of all industrial estates will be undertaken and a digital land bank will be created. “Even the drone-based survey of industrial estates will be taken up, which has never happened till today. We don’t know which plot has been given to whom, which plots are vacant and whether a plot has been given on lease,” said Sawant.The chief minister also told manufacturing firms to stop using their CSR funds on activities in other states and to instead contribute to the Goa CSR Authority. Sawant said that the CSR authority will use the funds to improve the industrial estates. “Whatever CSR certification you need, the Goa CSR authority is ready to give. Why are you spending your money on CSR activities in other states? Crores are spent on CSR activity in other states, but has any industry thought about spending the money in Goa for the industrial estate? The CSR authority has the mandate,” said Sawant.