A.P. Maritime Board gets nod to set up greenfield port, mega shipbuilding cluster at Dugarajapatnam

The Andhra Pradesh government issued a G.O. on Friday, permitting the Andhra Pradesh Maritime Board (APMB) to take necessary action for the establishment of a greenfield port and a mega shipbuilding cluster at Dugarajapatnam in Tirupati District under the Shipbuilding Development Scheme (SbDS) of the Ministry of Ports, Shipping & Waterways. 

The G.O. stated that the APMB had already signed an MoU with Visakhapatnam Port Authority (VPA) for setting up the facility at Dugarajapatnam, which is a part of the Maritime India Vision 2030. 

The vision is to transform India into one of the world’s top five shipbuilding nations by 2047, with an envisaged shipbuilding output of 4.50 million gross tonnage (GT) per year from the current 0.01 million GT/year. 

The State government will form a Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV) for the construction of the port and the shipbuilding cluster and steps are being taken to acquire 2,000 acres of land for the project. The APMB will transfer the lands to the SPV towards State government’s equity under the SbDS scheme. 

The project comprises an anchor shipyard of a capacity of 0.50 GT per annum and it is to be achieved in a maximum of 10 years from the date of commissioning of the shipyard. The APMB has been authorised to take action under the ambit of the SPV to get the project going within the contours of the scheme guidelines.