India's KCP Limited to inject extra $60 mln into sugar, biomass power plants in south-central Vietnam

Indian-invested KCP Vietnam Industries Limited has proposed raising the capacity of its Son Hoa sugar plant to 15,000 tons of sugarcane per day and deploying the 45 MW second phase of its 75 MW KCP Phu Yen biomass power plant, both in Phu Yen province.

The additional investment capital is $60 million, Kavitha Dut, joint managing director of KCP Limited, said at a meeting with provincial People's Committee Chairman Ta Anh Tuan last Friday.

She said KCP Vietnam, a subsidiary of KCP Limited, hopes to receive Phu Yen leaders' support in fulfilling procedures for the implementation per schedule.

In response, Tuan said that the people's committee had sent a dispatch to the Ministry of Industry and Trade proposing to include the biomass power project in the adjusted National Power Plan VIII.

He also assigned relevant agencies to guide KCP Vietnam to complete the procedures for in-principle approval.

The chairman added that he hopes Kavitha Dut and KCP Limited will encourage and support other Indian enterprises to explore projects in areas where Phu Yen has potential and strengths.

KCP Vietnam, located at 24/3 street in Son Hoa district, Phu Yen, operates in production and trading of high-quality RE sugar and sugar by-products.

Its parent company, KCP Limited, was established in 1941 in India. The group is known as a sugar producer, a cement maker, a hotel service provider, and a manufacturer of high-quality machinery for heavy industries like sugar processing, cement, heavy engineering, mineral processing, energy, and aerospace.

In 1997, to join Vietnam's "One Million Tons of Sugar" program", KCP Limited established KCP Vietnam and invested in a sugar refinery with a capacity of 2,500 tons of sugarcane per day in the central town of Hue.

However, due to a lack of sugarcane raw materials, this sugar refinery was relocated to Son Hoa district, Phu Yen, in 2000.

In 2001, the office and plant of KCP Vietnam, located at 24/3 street, Son Hoa district, officially came into operation, with an initial capacity of 2,500 tons of sugarcane a day.

The plant later saw its capacity expanded to 10,000 tons of sugarcane per day, along with a 30 MW biomass power plant which was already connected to the national grid. The total investment capital of the company was $103 million.

To diversify products and meet the increasing demand of customers, the enterprise increased the capacity of its second sugar factory in Dong Xuan district, Phu Yen to 1,000 tons of sugarcane per day in 2009.

KCP Vietnam has created the main source of income for about 10,000 households which conduct sugarcane farming on an area of over 20,000 hectares. The plant also created jobs for more than 700 direct and indirect workers.