KHAMMAM: The district administration of Khammam is focusing on increasing the number of entrepreneurs by encouraging locals, especially youth to set up food processing units, which it believes are viable and sustainable as a business. Several seminars have been hosted at both mandal and district levels with the help of the Industries department to inform and assist those willing to set up small-scale industries, especially in the field of food processing.
Khammam has thousands of acres of farmland dedicated to food crops and processing it within the district level will reduce costs and open doors for export. Keeping this in mind, District Collector VP Gowtham advised the Industries department to focus on setting up food processing units.
District Industries department general manager K Ajay Kumar said that the administration is ready to provide a subsidy of up to Rs 10 lakh to individual units and up to Rs 1 crore to group units willing to raise an industry with a capital expenditure ranging between Rs 10 lakh to Rs 4 crores. Ajay also said that the department has planned to sanction about 450 food processing units this year.
The DC said that Khammam is famous for producing chillies. “We can make medicines, extract colours and oil from the chilly crop and export it to countries like China,” he added. He said that the administration aims to spread the spirit of entrepreneurship in the district and ensure that the inhabitants are financially independent.