Nandan Bio sign pact for bio-fuel refinery

Ahmedabad: The Hyderabad-based Nandan Biomatrix Ltd has formed a 50:50 joint venture with the Ahmedabad-based V Worldwide Group to cultivate jatropha in one lakh acres of unproductive wasteland in Gujarat and set up a Rs 150-crore refinery to extract bio-fuel, to be sold to oil PSUs.

The duo, in collaboration with Africans, is also working on cultivating jatropha in 50,000 acres (200 square km) in Ethiopia, 600 km from the capital Addis Ababa, with possible investments from European investors, Mr C.S. Jadhav, Director (Marketing), Nandan Biomatrix, said.

Initially, the joint venture, Vitale Nandan Biopharma Science Pvt Ltd, has leased 5,000 acres of wasteland in Surendranagar and Patan districts of Gujarat where plantation of jatropha would begin in a couple of months.

The venture would establish a bio-diesel value chain including plantation as well as to crush and extract non-edible oil from jatropha.

“We will buy back the yield and set up our own refinery with a capacity of crushing 250 to 300 tonnes of oilseed a day, after about two years when the yield becomes optimum.”

Mr Jadhav said nearly 33 million acres of wasteland was available in India, including five to six lakh acres in Gujarat.

Nandan had already tied up with Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd (BPCL) and the Uttar Pradesh Government for a similar jatropha plantation project in the northern state having one million acres of wasteland.

Nandan Biomatrix’s turnover in 2007-08 was Rs 70 crore with a bottomline of Rs 6 crore. It expected to double the figures this fiscal. The turnover of V Worldwide Group in the last financial year was Rs 100 crore, 65 per cent of which came from pharmaceuticals.