BENGALURU: Deputy Chief Minister Dr CN Ashwath Narayan on Sunday said the government was working on developing and strengthening the Mysuru-Bidar industrial corridor on the lines of the Bengaluru-Chennai and Bengaluru-Mumbai corridors, and would soon announce an economic system policy to help enhance R&D of the electronics industry.
“Formation of a new policy to strengthen the sector is on the cards,” he said, while speaking at the Future Karnataka Summit 2020 webinar.
Speaking at the inauguration of the webinar, where 25 leaders discussed various topics, the DyCM said that apart from information and technology, the government is also working towards bringing reforms in the special economic regions through industrialisation.
A list of items is being prepared on what countries like Japan, Taiwan, Korea and the USA need, and Karnataka will take the lead in manufacturing and exporting those items. A special investigation task force has been formed under the chief secretary.
He said their target is to make Karnataka a $500-billion market in the next five years.
“Of the Fortune 500 companies, at least 400 have a presence in Karnataka, and now the state is working towards drawing the remaining also.”
While earlier, the state would buy PPE kits, now each day, five lakh PPE kits are being made against the demand for 1.95 lakh kits. Soon, the state will start exporting them to other countries, Narayan added.
“The opposition has criticised the government over the APMC Act, industrial policies and many other decisions. However, they should know that it has been accepted well by citizens, farmers and the industrial sector. Many have already started to reap its benefits. It has been ascertained that 16% GDP is from the agricultural sector, so the government is making all efforts to increase the Goods and Services Tax network from this sector. Even a 1% increase will make a lot of difference, hence agri-tech is the focus of the government now, and many startups are showing interest in this field,” he said.