Indian firm to make solar panels in Zambia
Written by Millennium on June 4, 2019
BUSINESS REPORTER writes
@SunZambian
A GROUP of companies from India’s GOA State, AGRAWAL, plans to build a 100MW capacity solar panel manufacturing facility in Zambia.
Group Chairman KRISHNAKUMAR AGRAWAL said the project would cost FIVE Million US Dollars private capital investment.
He said the exercise might take six months if the company completed the registration and legal process as well as getting satisfaction with the market demand.
Mr. AGRAWAL said the project would result in jobs creation and skills transfer to the Zambian populace especially youths, for the company founded in 1950, currently running a 60MW solar panel manufacturing facility in GOA.
He said the company had special skills in executing OFF- grid and ON- grid projects for open access market while the rest of the solar energy is sold to government in addition to large scale solar pumps.
This came to light when Zambia’s High Commissioner to India Judith Kapijimpanga toured the solar manufacturing company in the Indian State of GOA, TWO Thousand kilometres away from the Indian Capital, NEW DELHI.
And Ms. Kapijimpanga says GOA State has determined investors such as Mr. Narayan Bandekar who built a pharmaceutical manufacturing plant at the Lusaka South Multi Facility -MFEZ and SAFAL Managing Director Pankaj Jain, running a manganese factory in Serenje.
She says Zambia has eight months of continuous sunshine, progressive banking system and a strong legal framework that supports private sector investment.
Ms. Kapijimpanga says the Mission recorded three companies in the first quarter of the year 2019 that started actualising investment in Zambia among them PRASAD Seeds, VAGMI Cottons and OM Rollers and Smelters with combined investment worth over US$ 100 million.
She said more investment would increase total investment from India above the currentUS$8 billion.
