Rs 4,300 cr investment in warehouses estimated for West Bengal by 2020

Kolkata, Jan 17: JLL, India’s largest real estate services firm, predicted that the next coming years (2018 – 2020) will see Rs 4,300 crore of investment in warehousing and logistics in West Bengal.

This was revealed at the 4th Bengal Global Summit 2018, which concluded here today.
JLL India also released an insightful report entitled “Bengal-Destination Next for Improved Infrastructure & Efficient Logistics” as part of the event. The report highlighted that the state is strategically placed on the India map to take advantage of the ongoing national projects and development into a hub for warehousing and logistics for the country as well as the ASEAN region.
With a pipeline of MOU’s that the West Bengal government is expected to execute in the next three years, the state will see over Rs 4,300 crores being invested mostly creating state-of-the-art warehousing facilities strategically placed around the state. The state that acts as a gateway to north – east and to South Eastern countries has a
total stock of 11.6 million square feet (msf) of warehousing space.
This is set to go up by CAGR 28% with supply moving upto 22 msf. The key markets across the state that would see the first phase of development include, Dankuni, Alampur / Dhulagarh, Ulberia, Kalyani, and Sirakol, and, mostly around Kolkata. Further, potential logistics nodes such as Asansol – Durgapur, Haldia and Siliguri would be seeing
additional developments in the next phases.
JLL ceo and country head Ramesh Nair sad, “West Bengal is standing at a turning point of logistics revolution with lot of opportunities knocking the doors. GST implementation has opened up floodgates for logistics opportunities in Bengal as it has eradicated the state boundary for logistics which has opened up windows of distribution
opportunity in East and North East India - imminent from the growing developer interest in the region and the proposed MMLP. It’s time to see how the state improves its status on ‘Ease of Doing Business’ and adopts to the changing needs of the sector and embrace growth.”
Some of the prominent national developers that will be creating / handholding the growth include, IndoSpace, Embassy Industrial Park, Jalan Industrial Park, Srijan Logistic Park, Frontier Warehousing, Apeejay Group, Manas etc.
“India has the good potential to give a higher returns on investments compared some of the developed nations. India currently gives an average yield of 6.5% on a long term government bonds which can be deemed as risk free rate of return. Investors can safely assume a premium over this risk free rate of return for any investment in the
country. The risk premium would however depend on the various aspects of the project like location, size, phase etc. Investing in these warehouse and logistics destination becomes the most logistical destination for developed countries,” Ramesh added further.
Nandu Belani, President, CREDAI Bengal says : “Bengal is witnessing growth in various real estate sectors coupled with Govt.’s push for infrastructure and the state’s strategic location in eastern India. Going forward, we would be seeing many investments of different types and sizes in this space across the state. We showcased the sunshine industry of 'Warehousing', at Bengal Global Business Summit 2018 because this sector has enormous opportunities for real estate players as the sheer number of key warehousing clusters serving Kolkata keep
growing”.
West Bengal stands at an advantage with large scale infrastructure developments like Dedicated Freight Corridor, Multi-Modal Logistics Parks, Sagarmala Project and others aims to integrate multiple modes for a seamless logistics & distribution. The key project that would have a direct impact on the state’s warehouse. 
Higher infrastructure spending: INR 202 billion allocated in 2017 state budget for the purpose of infrastructure development Cross-country distribution advantage: Bhutan border Road, Asian Highway II to improve the cross country distribution positioning of Bengal.
Inland Waterway Distribution Advantage: Proposed 1,620 kms long National Waterway 1 (NW-1) on Ganga from Haldia to Allahabad is inspected to add an extra logistics distribution model.
Tajpur Port – Tajpur to be developed as a major port by Bhor Sagar Port Ltd, a SPV formed by the Central government-owned Kolkata Port Trust and the State government at Sagar Island. It will be developed as a landlord port, in which the basic infrastructure will be funded by the government while private firms will set up the super-structure to handle cargo.
Kaladan Multi Modal Transit Transport Project – India and Myanmar to create multi-modal mode of transport for shipment of cargo from the eastern ports of India to Myanmar as well as to the North-Eastern part of India through Myanmar. It will connect Sittwe Port in Myanmar to the eastern Indian seaport of Kolkata. UNI