OMCs to invest ~90,000 cr on fuel upgrade

Bhubaneswar: Oil marketing companies (OMCs) will be investing Rs 90,000 crore by 2020 on fuel upgradation programme.
“The oil companies have spent more than Rs 28,000 crore after 2010 which is in addition to Rs 35,000 crore that was already spent till 2010. They will further spend Rs 28,000 crore by 2020 for meeting the BS-VI specifications which will take the total investment to Rs 90,000 crore only on fuel upgradation programme itself," said K D Tripathi, secretary, ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas at the launching of BS-IV grade fuels across the country.
“Our fuel quality standards have been gradually tightened since the mid 90’s. Investing on fuel quality improvement was critical to the success of the vehicular emissions programme. Our refineries have achieved the target with the introduction of advanced technologies with significant capital expenditure”, he added.
It may be noted that the fuel upgradation programme took off with the notification of vehicular emission norms for new vehicles in 1991. BS 2000 (Bharat Stage 1) vehicle emission norms were introduced for new vehicles from April 2000 and this was followed by BS-II emission norms for new cars in Delhi from 2000 and extended to the other metros in 2001. BS- III was implemented in phases during 2005-2010. The current BS-IV fuel with 50 ppm sulphur was introduced in year and today, it covered the entire country.

However, the government, in 2016, has decided to meet the international best practices to leapfrog directly to BS-VI norms by skipping BS-V altogether by April 1, 2020.
There are about 23 oil refineries in India with a combined capacity of 230 million tonnes per annum.
“Today, we begin a new era of clean transportation fuels that will benefit 1.25 billion citizens of our country by substantially reducing pollution levels in our cities," Dharmendra Pradhan, minister of state for Petroleum and Natural Gas said.
He also complimented the OMCs- Indian Oil Corporation Ltd (IOCL), Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd (BPCL) and Hindustan Petroleum Corporation (HPCL) for working in unison to launch the BS-IV grade fuels as per the schedule.

India adds record 5,400MW wind power in 2016-17

New Delhi: India added a record 5,400 megawatts (MW) of wind power in 2016-17, exceeding its 4,000MW target.
“This year’s achievement surpassed the previous higher capacity addition of 3,423MW achieved in the previous year,” the ministry of new renewable energy said a statement on Sunday.
Of about 50,018MW of installed renewable power across the country, over 55% is wind power.
In India, which is the biggest greenhouse gas emitter after the US and China, renewable energy currently accounts for about 16% of the total installed capacity of 315,426MW.
During 2016-17, the leading states in the wind power capacity addition were Andhra Pradesh at 2,190MW, followed by Gujarat at 1,275MW and Karnataka at 882MW.
In addition, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, Telangana and Kerala reported 357MW, 288MW, 262MW, 118MW, 23MW and 8MW wind power capacity addition respectively during the same period.
At the Paris Climate Summit in December, India promised to achieve 175GW of renewable energy capacity by 2022. This includes 60GW from wind power, 100GW from solar power, 10GW from biomass and 5GW from small hydro projects.
It also promised to achieve 40% of its electricity generation capacity from non-fossil fuel based energy resources by 2030.
In the last couple of years, India has not only seen record low tariffs for solar power but wind power too has seen a significant drop in tariffs. In February, solar power tariffs hit a record low of Rs2.97 per kilowatt hour (kWh)and wind power tariff reached Rs3.46 kWh.
Even though wind leads India’s renewable power sector, it has huge growth potential. According to government estimates, the onshore wind power potential alone is about 302GW. But there are several problems plaguing the sector.
For instance, the government has been concerned about squatters blocking good wind potential sites, inordinate delays in signing of power purchase agreements, timely payments and distribution firms shying away from procuring electricity generated from wind energy projects. In January, the ministry held a meeting with the states to sort out these issues.
The ministry has also taken several other policy initiatives, including introducing bidding in the wind energy sector and drafting a wind-solar hybrid policy.
It has also come out with a ‘National Offshore Wind Energy Policy’, aiming to harness wind power along India’s 7,600 km coastline. Preliminary estimates show the Gujarat coastline has the potential to generate around 106,000MW of offshore wind energy and Tamil Nadu about 60,000MW.

RBI increases FPI limits in govt bonds by Rs170 billion

New Delhi: The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has raised the limit on investment in government bonds by foreign portfolio investors (FPI) by an aggregate Rs 170 billion (US$ 2.62 billion) during the April-June 2017 period. The investment limit in central government securities have been increased by Rs 110 billion (US$ 1.7 billion), which takes the total increase in the investment caps in g-secs by FPIs up to Rs 2,310 billion (US$ 35.63 billion) from Rs 2,200 billion (US$ 35.32 billion) earlier. The limit for State development loans have been raised by Rs 60 billion (US$ 925 million), thereby increasing the total limit to Rs 270 billion (US$ 4.16 billion) from the earlier Rs 210 billion (US$ 3.24 billion). The cap on general category has been increased to Rs 1,565 billion (US$ 24.14 billion) from Rs 1,520 billion (US$ 23.45 billion), whereas the limit for long term investors have been raised to Rs 745 billion (US$ 11.49 billion) from Rs 680 billion (US$ 10.49 billion) earlier.

India needs Rs43 trillion of investment in infrastructure over next 5 years: Jaitley

New Delhi: India has a huge unmet need for investment in infrastructure, estimated to the tune of Rs43 trillion or about $646 billion over the next five years. 70% of which will be required in the power, roads and urban infrastructure sectors, finance minister Arun Jaitley said on Saturday.
Speaking at the inauguration of the 2nd annual meeting of New Development Bank by the five member BRICS (Brazil-Russia-India-China-South Africa) countries, Jaitley said in emerging markets and developing economies (EMDEs), the overall growth is picking up, although growth prospects diverge across countries. “But there are newer challenges, most notably a possible shift towards inward-looking policy platforms and protectionism, a sharper than expected tightening in global financial conditions that could interact with balance sheet weaknesses in parts of the euro area and increased geopolitical tensions, including unpredictable economic policy of USA,” he saids.
Amidst the challenges, Jaitley said lie the opportunities with the estimated unmet demand for infrastructure investment in emerging market and developing economies (EMDEs) is gargantuan, estimated at above $1 trillion a year by the World Bank. “Most importantly, the EMDEs need to carry out this huge investment in a sustainable manner. The established MDBs are now capital constrained, and with their over emphasis on processes, are unable to meet this financing challenge. A Bank like the NDB is well poised to step into the void,” he added.
Chinese finance minister Xiao Jie speaking at the event said BRICS countries should work towards reforming the global economic system since voice of the emerging economies that contribute 80% of global growth remains “gravely inadequate” in multilateral institutions.
Jaitley said India has proposed projects worth about $2 billion for NDB funding, which he hopes will be taken up by the Board expeditiously. “We shall work with the NDB to develop a strong shelf of projects in specific areas such as Smart Cities, renewable energy, urban transport, including Metro Railways, clean coal technology, solid waste management and urban water supply,” he added.
In the annual meeting, the five member board of governors will deliberate on Bank’s strategy for the next 5 years, including issues such as the Bank’s capital, loan portfolio and expansion of Membership. “The uniqueness of NDB should lie in faster loan appraisal, a lean organizational structure resulting in lower cost of loans, a variety of financing instruments, including local currency financing, adoption of country system whenever possible and flexibility in responding to the needs of the clients. These are the elements which would make NDB truly a “new” institution, and make it distinct from older MDBs (multilateral development banks),” Jailey said.

India to grow at 7.7% in 2018 in face of newer global challenges: Jaitley

New Delhi: India’s economic growth is expected to pick up in the coming years following a raft of reforms such as demonetisation and the rollout of the Goods and Services Tax, although developing countries face global challenges of trade restrictions, finance minister Arun Jaitley said on Saturday.
Addressing the second annual meeting of the New Development Bank (NDB) in Delhi, Jaitley said a possible shift towards inward-looking policies and protectionism and a sharper than expected tightening in global financial conditions, the crisis in Europe and increased geopolitical tensions, posed a challenge to the emerging economies.
Citing the projections of International Monetary Fund, Jaitley said India’s GDP growth in 2016 would be 6.6%, while the same would be 7.2% and 7.7% in 2017 and 2018 respectively. The IMF projections for 2017 and 2018 corresponds with India’s financial years (April-March) 2017-18 and 2018-19.
India’s stats office, CSO, has estimated economic growth to slow to 7.1% in 2016-17 from 7.9% in the previous year. The government’s Economic Survey projects the GDP growth at 6.75-7.5% in 2017-18.
“We have successfully implemented a slew of reform measures,” Jaitley said listing out the demonetisation drive, passage of crucial bills in Lok Sabha to roll out the Goods and Services Tax, the Insolvency and Bankruptcy law, and relaxing foreign investment rules.
Jaitley said India wants $2 billion loans for various projects from the NDB, earlier called BRICS Bank as it set up by the emerging nations India, China, Brazil, Russia and South Africa.
“India has a huge unmet need for investment in infrastructure, estimated to the tune of Rs 43 lakh crore (about $646 billion) over the next five years,” he said.
About 70% of the funds will be required in the power, roads and urban infrastructure sectors, he said.
”This offers an enormous opportunity to an Institution like NDB, whose core mandate is sustainable infrastructure development. We shall work with the NDB to develop a strong shelf of projects in specific areas such as Smart Cities, renewable energy, urban transport, including Metro Railways, clean coal technology, solid waste management and urban water supply,” he summed up.

Regulatory changes will attract global investors to India: Christian Ulbrich, CEO, JLL INC

New Delhi: The outlook on Indian real estate has been turning positive from global investors’ perspective owing to regulatory reforms.
The policy initiatives, including the much-awaited implementation of the Real Estate Regulatory Act is making real estate more attractive for large institutional investors, Christian Ulbrich , CEO - JLL, told Kailash Babar in an exclusive interaction.
India is clearly moving in the right direction which is inspiring confidence among global investors looking to invest in regions with a long-term view, he said. Edited excerpts.
How are foreign investors viewing the ongoing transformation in terms of regulatory developments, in Indian real estate?
India grew the fastest among major economies worldwide, at just over 7 per cent last year. It will continue to drive global growth in 2017, with its share in the world GDP expected to rise to 17 per cent. On the back of very positive changes in its regulatory framework, India is now a lot more attractive to foreign investors.
Some other important developments that will impact Indian real estate very favourably are the increased rate of consolidation, improved transparency and the fact that REITs (Real Estate Investment Trusts) are very likely to be launched this year. Increased foreign and domestic investor participation is more or less a given in the times ahead.
More Fortune 1000 companies are now looking at increasing their exposure in India, attracted by the efforts being put in by the government on the country’s ‘ease of doing business’ rankings and the overall policy framework.
In particular, the office asset class will attract very significant interest from global investors in 2017. Foreign developers are actively pursuing strategic partnerships and are looking to forge more joint ventures in India, and Asian developers—particularly from China and Japan —will be investing about $3-4 billion into the country’s real estate sector over the next three years.
They are primarily focusing on mega industrial projects. Already, 2016 saw a very visible return of equity investments in India, and we witnessed private equity inflows here increase to the tune of 62 per cent from a year ago.
Last year alone, the total private equity inflows stacked up to Rs 38,000 crore, which is an impressive jump over the Rs 23,500 crore of 2015. This year is likely to emerge as even better than 2016, despite Brexit and the outcome of US presidential elections.
Where does the Indian real estate stand vis-à-vis global markets in terms of transparency? Will the Real Estate Regulatory Act and other policy changes help in improving accountability and transparency?
In JLL’s 2016 Global Real Estate Transparency Index (GRETI), India’s tier-I cities edged up the 36th rank on the back of improvements in structural reforms & liberalisation of the foreign direct investment (FDI) policy.
The 36th spot is among 109 countries and accounts for an improvement of 4 positions. Today, Indian tier-II cites rank higher than China’s tier-1.5 & tier-2 cities. Investors increasingly look at geographically diverse cities, local data availability & coverage.
While globally the divide between primary, secondary &tertiary cities is wide, India now presents a different case because there is the relatively consistent availability of data across its city tiers.
India’s less spectacular score in transaction process —or the high costs of investment transactions — and the weak professional standards among local agents will doubtlessly see improvement in the 2016-18 assessment period of JLL’s next Transparency Index. The enactment of the Real Estate (Regulation and Development) Act and arrival of a reliable real estate regulator will play a key role here.
How would you rank India as a prospective REITs market for global investors?
The formation of Real Estate Investment Trusts (REITs) will be a major disruptor by aiding the expansion of India’s quality real estate universe and giving developers another instrument to exit their projects.
India has a massive REIT potential, with around 229 million sq. ft of office space currently being REIT-compliant. Even with only about half of this being listed over the next few years, we are looking at a total REIT listing worth $18.5 billion. Moreover, as India’s stock of Grade-A and superior Grade-A commercial assets grows, it presents great opportunities for REITs and scores of their potential retail investors.
How is the Indian property market placed in the current international scenario with respect to pricing and investment transactions?
India is home to six of the world’s 30 most dynamic cities. In JLL’s City Momentum Index (CMI) 2017, the country’s primary IT and technology hub —Bengaluru —sits right on top. Indian real estate has attracted about $32 billion in private equity so far.
The global capital flows into Indian real estate in 2016 stood at nearly $5.7 billion. Globally, capital allocations to real estate are growing. We expect in the next decade, more than $1trillion will be targeting the sector globally, compared to $700 billion now.
This growth means investors are demanding further improvements in real estate transparency, and expecting the standards in real estate to be at least on a par with other asset classes.

India, Korea to cooperate on startups, tech transfer

New Delhi: The Government of India and the Government of South Korea have agreed to provide support to each other’s start-ups in accordance with their respective country's schemes and programmes, and also enhance cooperation in areas of technology transfer, joint ventures, business alliances and facilitation of mutual market access. The decision was made at Korea-India small and medium enterprise (SME) bilateral working group meeting, where the Korean delegation was led by Mr Young-sup Joo, SME Minister, and the Indian delegation was led by Mr Kalraj Mishra, Union MSME Minister, Government of India. The representatives of both the sides briefed about their respective policies for promotion and development of SMEs to have a better understanding of their policies and identify areas of cooperation. An Agreement has been made to form a joint task force to prepare the action plan on this proposal discussed and timelines by the end of 2017.

Govt awards 128 regional routes to Air India, Air Deccan, SpiceJet among others

New Delhi: The civil aviation ministry on Thursday awarded first-ever regional flights based on a new subsidy model to five airlines that will expand flights to many new airports in the country.
Air India, Air Deccan, SpiceJet, Air Odisha and Turbo Megha have got rights to fly 128 routes which will require them to cap half the seats at about 50% of the fare.
Many of these airports will be served for the first time. These include airports like Shimla, Kandla, Puducherry, Bhatinda, Cooch Behar and Bilaspur among others.
Aviation secretary R.N. Choubey said Rs205 crore of subsidy will be provided to these airlines. Routes will be exclusive for three years.
UDAN, the regional aviation scheme which will be in operation for 10 years, envisages providing connectivity to unserved and underserved cities and towns by reviving existing airstrips and airports.
This would be achieved by providing financial stimulus in the form of central and state government concessions, as well as viability gap funding for interested airlines to kick off operations while ensuring passenger fares are kept affordable.
The fare for a one-hour journey of about 500km on a fixed wing aircraft or a 30-minute journey on a helicopter will be capped at Rs2,500, with proportionate pricing for routes of different lengths and duration.
However, many airlines like IndiGo, SpiceJet, GoAir and Jet Airways have gone to court against the levy imposed by the government on existing flights to fund UDAN. Since the levy was introduced by the government in December most have not paid the sum accrued from the levy to the government.

Centre to build 1 crore houses under PMAY-G by 2019

New Delhi: The Government today said that it has approved the construction of 1 crore houses with the financial implication of Rs. 81,975 crore for the period 2016-17 to 2018-19. The Minister of State for Rural Development Shri Ram Kripal Yadav said in a written reply to a question in the Lok Sabha that as per provisional figures of Socio Economic and Caste Census (SECC) 2011, approximately 4 crore rural households face housing deprivation. After accounting for the houses that were constructed under Indira Aawas Yojana, IAY and State sponsored housing schemes since 2011, it has been estimated that 2.95 crore more houses, with an anticipated variation of ± 10%, would need to be constructed to achieve the objective of ‘Housing For All’ by the year 2022.
In the first phase (from 2016-17 to 2018-19) one crore houses are targeted for construction under Pradhan Mantri Aawas Yojana-Grameen, PMAY-G. Targets for the remaining period (till 2022) will be decided after verification and finalisation of permanent wait lists, based on SECC 2011 data by all States/UTs. Shri Yadav said that to provide technical support in achieving the targets of “Housing for All” a National Technical Support Agency (NTSA) for Rural Housing shall be set up at the national level.
The Minister informed that to achieve the objective of ‘Housing for All’ various features have been incorporated into the scheme architecture of PMAY-G, some of which are as below:
(i) Availability of sufficient financial resources both in the form of budgetary support and borrowing from NABARD to meet the expenditure for construction of houses.
(ii) Electronic transfer of assistance under Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) to resolve problems of delayed payments and expedite completion.
(iii) Comprehensive online monitoring through the scheme MIS-AwaasSoft.
(iv) Inspection and Geo tagging of houses, through the mobile app- AwaasApp by beneficiaries to reduce delays.
(v) Increasing number of trained rural masons through Training, Assessment and Certification.
(vi) Setting up of Programme Management Unit (PMUs) at state and sub state level to review progress on a daily basis, provide requisite technical support and facilitation and plug gaps in implementation using administrative funds available under the scheme.

Hit by falling revenue, Twitter may collect subscription fees from premium users

Twitter is considering whether to build a premium version of its popular Tweetdeck interface aimed at professionals, the company said on Thursday, raising the possibility that it could collect subscription fees from some users for the first time.
Like most other social media companies, Twitter since its founding 11 years ago has focused on building a huge user base for a free service supported by advertising. Last month it reported it had 319 million users worldwide.






But unlike the much-larger Facebook Inc, Twitter has failed to attract enough in advertising revenue to turn a profit even as its popularity with US President Donald Trump and other celebrities makes the network a constant centre of attention.
Subscription fees could come from a version of Tweetdeck, an existing interface that helps users navigate Twitter.
Twitter is conducting a survey "to assess the interest in a new, more enhanced version of Tweetdeck," spokeswoman Brielle Villablanca said in a statement on Thursday.
She went on: "We regularly conduct user research to gather feedback about people's Twitter experience and to better inform our product investment decisions, and we're exploring several ways to make Tweetdeck even more valuable for professionals."
There was no indication that Twitter was considering charging fees from all its users.
Word of the survey had earlier leaked on Twitter, where a journalist affiliated with the New York Times posted screenshots of what a premium version of Tweetdeck could look like.
That version could include "more powerful tools to help marketers, journalists, professionals, and others in our community find out what is happening in the world quicker," according to one of the screenshots posted on the account @andrewtavani.
The experience could be ad-free, the description said.
Other social media firms, such as Microsoft Corp's LinkedIn unit, already have tiered memberships, with subscription versions that offer greater access and data.
In the fourth quarter of 2016, Twitter posted the slowest revenue growth since it went public four years earlier, and revenue from advertising fell year-over-year. The company also said that advertising revenue growth would continue to lag user growth during 2017.
Financial markets speculated about a sale of Twitter last year, but no concrete bids were forthcoming.