The Orissa government has finalised the new MoU to be signed with Posco India to set up a steel plant in the state. ?The new MoU is ready and the signing ceremony will be held any day from now,? said a senior official in the state chief secretary’s office.
Chief secretary BK Patnaik is now monitoring the Posco project. He said the draft MoU has been cleared by all the departments concerned. According to him, four major changes have been made from the original MoU, which was signed in 2005 and expired in June 2010.
Under the new MoU, Posco India will now have to swap iron ore from the country through the state-owned Orissa Mining Corporation (OMC). In the original MoU, the South Korean company had been allowed to swap up to 30% of the 600 million tonne iron ore promised to it anywhere it wanted.
Posco India will have to cough up an additional Rs 62.41 crore towards the cost of government land as the new MoU provides that the land cost would be charged at the price fixed in the Industrial Policy Resolution (IPR), 2007. In the original MoU, it was provided that the land cost would be charged as per the prices fixed in the IPR 2001.
The senior official said the state government?s job reservation policy of 2009 has been incorporated in the new MoU. As per the policy, all industries setting up units in Orissa will have to reserve 90% of unskilled jobs for local people, including the project affected families, 60% for semi-skilled jobs and 30% supervisory jobs for people of the state.
