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Indian group to invest in sugar, paper in Ethiopia

By Addis Mulugeta

Capital

Indian companies organized as the Chadha Group are to invest on sugarcane plantation, and sugar, paper and ethanol production with a total capital of 190 million dollars. Chadha has received 100,000 hectares of land in Ethiopia's Oromia Region.

The project is scheduled to be implemented in the coming Ethiopian new year.
An agreement between Chadha and a local contractor is expected to be signed next week for a 20 km road that will connect the investment site to the main road.
Naseem Ahmed, representative of the Chadha group, told Capital that during the project’s first phase it will provide 4500 permanent jobs and this will reach 10,000 after three years.

“Part of the profit is planned to be spent on health, education and on other social facilities for the community around the plantation,” said the representative.
Sugar produced by the new factory is planned for both domestic and international markets. But considering the climbing price of oil, the ethanol produced from the byproduct of sugar will be only for the domestic market. The Group’s paper plant, will manufacture Kraft and semi Kraft papers.

According to Naseem, the Chadha Group is also studying the southern and Gambella regions for further investment.

The Chadha Group is engaged in real estate development, entertainment, commerce, multiplexes and malls, restaurants and night clubs, film distribution, paper, sugar, distillery, mining, liquor retail and food processing.
Apart from soft loans from India amounting to USD 700 million in the last two years a new trend is emerging from India for financing various projects in Ethiopia. In the last six months various Indian companies received Suppliers Credit amounting to USD 100 million through Indian commercial banks supported by the Export Credit Guarantee Corporation of India (ECGC), to execute electricity projects in Ethiopia.