The Union Ministry of Commerce has said recently that concerns of developers and units in revamping the SEZ (special economic zone) Act has been taken seriously by the government. After taking into consideration the views, concerns and opinions of various stakeholders, the Department of Commerce has now submitted its report and it is under the active consideration of the Union Government, Madhusudan Prasad, Additional Secretary, Union Ministry of Commerce said.
He was speaking at an export awards function organised in Chennai. On their part, SEZ developers want the lands areas for multi product SEZs to be reduced from 2,500 acres to 1,000 acres. Getting large tracts of contiguous land in the country is a major challenge, Sunil Rallan, president, TASID (Tamil Nadu Association of SEZ Infrastructure Developers) said.
He added that the body had also petitioned for lowering of land limits for sector specific SEZs from 250 acres to 100 acres and other sectors (like free trade warehousing zones) from 100 acres to 62.5 acres. For IT companies, TASID has stated the area size for IT SEZs to be brought down from 25 acres to one lakh square metre of built up areas in cities like Chennai and Bangalore.