India plans to widen range of steel grades in manufacturing incentive plan

By Adrija Chatterjee and Swansy Afonso

India plans to widen the range of steel grades covered by a government incentive program in a bid to boost output and back Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s goal to establish the nation as a global manufacturing hub.
 

The steel ministry is in talks with other government departments and domestic industry to include more types of the alloy in the so-called production-linked incentive program, Steel Secretary Nagendra Nath Sinha said in an interview. “We hope to come out with something in this regard in a few months.”

India has already approved an investment of about 6,300 cr rupees ($770 million) over five years to make high-grade specialty steel. “The government is keen that India becomes a country which can produce all grades of steel competitively,” Sinha said. The nation is the biggest steel maker after China.

Modi is seeking to boost local manufacturing and lure the world’s top brands to make products locally for export through use of production-linked incentives. The prime minister has pitched India as an alternative manufacturing hub, as more companies become wary of the risks of depending on China.

The ministry also plans to incentivize green technologies like hydrogen, Sinha said. The country has about a dozen task forces working on ways to help policy makers respond to demand for low-carbon emission steel production, he said.

The ministry has made 455 cr rupees available to companies under the National Green Hydrogen Mission for research and development in this space.

The government is also monitoring European Union plans for a carbon tax. “Carbon-efficient steel exporters from India may not be impacted,” he said.