Emami Paper Mills is reportedly planning to invest roughly Rs10bn ($149.3m) to increase paper board making capacity at its facility at Balasore in the Indian state of Odisha.
The Balasore facility, which was set up at a cost of around Rs10bn ($149.3m) earlier this year, is expected to become operational in December this year.
The proposed investment is anticipated to increase the plant's production capacity from 1.32 lakh tons to 2.6 lakh tons over the next three years, The Hindu Businessline reported.
Emami Paper executive director PS Patwari was quoted by Business Standard as saying: "The demand for high-end coated multi-layered paperboard in the country is seven lakh tons currently and growing annually by over 15%."
The facility, which is under trial production, would attain 75% capacity utilization by the end of this year to produce four-layered paper board.
Emami Group director Aditya Agarwal said that at least 60% of the company's revenue is expected to be generated from high-end packaging paper business starting from 2016.
The company, which is the largest newsprint manufacturer in the country, is planning to invest in packaging paper production instead of expanding its newsprint business.
Patwari added: "The country's total consumption of newsprint is 27 lakh tonnes per annum, of which only 10 lakh tonnes is produced domestically and the rest imported.
"Local tax is levied on domestic newsprint but there is no such levy on imported newsprint. Thus, Indian newsprint industry is facing a crisis."
Besides newsprint and writing and printing paper production, Emami Paper is also involved in FMCG, edible oil, paper, writing instruments, healthcare, retail departmental stores and real estate businesses.
Image: The proposed investment is anticipated to increase the plant's paper board making capacity to 2.6 lakh tons. Photo: courtesy of Rawich / FreeDigitalPhotos.net.
