As many as 100 US companies keen on exiting China after the Covid-19 pandemic are seriously considering Uttar Pradesh as their new destination.
Uttar Pradesh’s minister in charge of MSMEs Siddharth Nath Singh on Tuesday engaged with them through a webinar, organised by the United States-India Strategic Partnership Forum. Representatives of these companies showed interest in the fields of agriculture, electronics, medicine, scientific instrumentation, logistics, defence, aviation, food processing MRO, etc. The companies include Lockheed Martin, Adobe, Honeywell, Boston Scientific and Cisco Systems as well as global delivery services providers like UPS and FedEx.
Several companies expressed their interest in leaving China and are looking for other investment destinations, including India. We discussed with them the scope of investment in UP and informed them that the state is home to more than 90 lakh MSMEs and skilled labour. With a stable government in the state, coupled with creation of a robust support infrastructure in terms of roads, water supply, irrigation capacity and 24×7 power supply, UP is among the frontrunners on the growth trajectory among large states of the nation,” Singh said.
The minister, along with a team of senior officers, including industrial development commissioner Alok Tandon and principal secretary, MSME and exports, Navneet Sehgal spoke to the representatives of the companies. The informed US companies that the state government had developed 21 sectoral policies, mainly in the areas of defence, pharmaceuticals, food processing, electronics and education sectors.
Mastercard was keen on exploring opportunities in rural areas by providing the facility of digital payment to kirana stores. UPS and Fredix evinced interest to invest in Jewar airport by developing logistic centres. Bostan Scientific has plans to set up a medical equipment plan.
Speaking to FE, Sehgal said companies had queried about incentives that UP would offer if they shift the base from China. “We told them about various incentives such as capital subsidy, land subsidy, etc and also informed them that UP already has a vast network of MSME units, which could be used for multiple purposes.”
It may be mentioned that only a day before, Prime Minister Modi had advised the states to turn the coronavirus crisis into an opportunity. In fact, even before the PM’s advice, chief minister Yogi Adityanath had tasked his ministers and officials with the job of chalking out ways in which the state can woo industries moving out of China after the outbreak of the coronavirus.
