Korean steel giant Posco shows fresh interest to set up plant in Odisha

In a virtual roundtable, South Korea Ambassador Shin Bongkil stated that Posco has plans to make one of the largest FDI in the history of India with an investment of US $12 billion to set up an integrated steel plant in Odisha.

Bhubaneshwar: The South Korean Steel major Posco, which had originally planned to set up a mega steel plant in Odisha more than 15 years back, bringing in then the largest Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) to India but later backed out from the project, has again shown interest to set up a mega steel plant in the state.

The South Korean steel giant had initially signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) in June 2005 with the Odisha government to set up a 12 million tone steel plant at the eastern port town of Paradeep.

However, the project did not see the light of the day despite Posco spending hundreds of crores of rupees on the acquisition of about 1,880 acres of land through the public sector Industrial Infrastructure Development Corporation of Odisha (IDCO). The company had even set up offices at Bhubaneswar and Paradeep, employed personnel and created infrastructure.

In February 2017, a frustrated Posco had bid a goodbye to the Odisha project and also returned the acquired land to the state government.

An indication that the South Korean Steel major was showing fresh interest in the Odisha project came from the country’s Ambassador to India Shin Bongkil who participated in a roundtable on ‘South Korea and Odisha: Promoting Bilateral Business Opportunities’ organised by the Indian Chamber of Commerce (ICC) in association with Industrial Promotion and Invest Corporation of Odisha Ltd (IPICOL) through virtual mode.

Bongkil said Korean steel giant Posco has plans to make one of the single largest FDI in the history of India with an investment of US $12 billion to set up an integrated steel plant in Odisha.

However, he did not spell out the further details of the proposed new project. The South Korean company had also not formally submitted any fresh proposal to the state government so far.

After a lapse of five years, Posco evincing fresh interest in setting up a steel plant in Odisha again has come as a big surprise. If the project materializes, certainly it would provide a big boost to the industrial and infrastructure development of Odisha.