Indian Institute of Chemical Technology (IICT) has projected the eastern and western sea costs of India as ideal locations for developing mega chemical industrial complexes (MCICs) aimed at the global dimensioning of Indian chemical and pharmaceutical sectors.

In this context, the Institute has suggested for a central policy decision to establish MCICs in the country to attract overseas enquiries and recommended setting up of a minimum of two MCICs (one each in East and West Coast) in the initial stages.

The institute also felt that the Indian chemical industry is to gain immensely by closely studying the Chinese and Singapore MCIC models and identifying a suitable model for the country that can cash in on India's demographic advantage in Asian region, strong economic links with USA and Europe, productive human capital and strong urge to enhance scale of

manufacture to global levels.

The relative advantages and disadvantages of MCIC models need to be very carefully assessed by a high level committee of national and international experts, opines Dr K V Raghavan, director IICT. Noting that Asia doesn't have a strong base for Co based chemicals and the C1 chemistry is highly eco-friendly and can produce a variety of basic chemical building blocks, he said that India can seriously examine the possibility of manufacturing acetic acid, DME, DMF, isocyanates, vinyl acetate, PVA, nylon 90 and other chemicals through C1 chemistry. The manufacturing base for DMT, propylene oxide and MTBE need to be strengthened in Asia. Indian MCICs should strongly support specialty chemical satellites to produce environmentally clean and high performance products for regional as well as global markets, he said.

'The predominance of small and medium scale sector in almost chemical manufacturing activities of chemical sector has to be given due attention. The MCIC concept should provide them necessary feedbacks, expertise and technologies at affordable cost levels and joint venture in investments for their expansion and structural reorganization. Strategic alliances between the constituents of MCICs and the downstream units are very essential. The need for development of industrially backward areas has to be given attention through proper linkage of MCIC and downstream industries. For quick start-ups, the location of MCICs in backward areas may not be a preferred solution.' he said.

According to Dr Raghavan, West Bengal, Orissa, Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu on the East Coast and Gujarat, Maharashtra, Karnataka and Kerala on the West Coast are potential states to host MCICs in India. Dr Raghavan has already submitted a proposal to the government of Andhra Pradesh for the setting up of a mega chemical industrial complex in the Eastern coastal belt of the state.

He said that MCICs could promote convergence driven synergies between chemical and energy, bulks and specialties, local and global and chemical and information technology. "The enviro drivers of global dimensioning are implementation of responsible care and adoption of near zero waste concepts in manufacturing. The clustering concept employed in MCICs does promote synergy driven alliances between Indian and Overseas investors, sharing of high quality services and downsizing of production overheads." He said.

Observing that Indian bulk chemical and petro scene is characterized by uneconomical production size, price disadvantage vis-à-vis imported products, non-global orientation of product mix resource and investment constraints at domestic level, sizable demand-production gap and minimal bulk intermediate exports, he pointed out that MCICs can bring in much change in the situation.

Providing quality manufacturing sites has to be the fundamental commitment of the MCIC concept. The major components are main manufacturing sites, utility generation and waste management facilities, occupational healthcare units, chemical and personnel transport systems, R&D link facilities, feedstock pre-processing facilities and non technical and technical business agencies. The latter includes E-commerce cells, IT hubs and chemical distributors and sellers. The non-technical ventures cover shopping centres, communication systems, hotels, travel services and allied agencies, he said.