CM: Let district industrial centres guide investors

Thiruvananthapuram: The district industrial centres should transform themselves as places that will help and guide investors, chief minister Pinarayi Vijayan said.
Inaugurating the workshop organised by the industries and commerce department, the chief minister said in addition to officials, industry experts should also be encouraged to visit the centres at least once in a week for guiding the investors.
The chief minister said the management of public sector undertakings should be done scientifically and the industries department should provide necessary training programmes in this regard. The PSUs should also appoint full-time directors in addition to CEOs and MDs, who can undertake day-to-day activities of the PSU, the chief minister said.
While suggesting that industries related to agriculture should be given more focus, the chief minister said the government is in the process of setting up coconut parks and a factory on the lines of CIAL for producing value-added products from rubber. He said the value-added products from agriculture products have great potential.
Stating that the government is considering industrial estates in collaboration with private sector, he said the biggest strength of the state is startups. In addition to IT sector, startups should come up in other sectors too, he said. He added that the government is aiming at facilitating the startups in other sectors as well. The government will facilitate in such a way that all investors including NRI investors can invest their funds safely.
Kerala has climbed up in the list of states with respect to sustainable development index. He said while the state scored only 68 points in 2018, it improved to 88 points in 2019. Industries minister E P Jayarajan, state planning board vice-chairman V K Ramachandran and principal secretary (industries) K Ellangovan spoke on the occasion.