Sitharaman launches ‘National Monetization Pipeline”
A Bill will be introduced to set up Development Financial Institution (DFI) which will act as a provider, enabler and catalyst for infrastructure financing with a lending portfolio of at least Rs.5 lakh crore in three years time, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman told parliament on 1 Feb 2021 with the presentation of Budget 2021-22.
She said Rs.20,000 crore has been provisioned in the Budget to capitalise DFI. This is in order to enable Debt Financing of InVITs and REITs by Foreign Portfolio Investors, a move to help in augmenting funds for infrastructure and real estate sectors.
The Minister also announced launch of a “National Monetization Pipeline” of potential brownfield infrastructure assets stating that Monetizing operating public infrastructure assets is a very important financing option for new infrastructure construction.
Sitharaman informed that an Asset Monetization dashboard will also be created for tracking the progress and to provide visibility to investors.
Some important measures in the direction of monetisation are as follows:
National Highways Authority of India and PGCIL each have sponsored one InvIT that will attract international and domestic institutional investors. Five operational roads with an estimated enterprise value of Rs.5,000 crore are being transferred to the NHAIInvIT.
Similarily, transmission assets of a value of Rs. 7,000 crore will be transferred to the PGCILInvIT.
Railways will monetize Dedicated Freight Corridor assets for operations and maintenance, after commissioning.
The next lot of Airports will be monetised for operations and management concession.
Other core infrastructure assets that will be rolled out under the Asset Monetization Programme are:
(i) NHAI Operational Toll Roads
(ii) Transmission Assets of PGCIL
(iii) Oil and Gas Pipelines of GAIL, IOCL and HPCL
(iv) AAI Airports in Tier II and III cities,
(v) Other Railway Infrastructure Assets
(vi) Warehousing Assets of CPSEs such as Central Warehousing Corporation and NAFED among others and
(vii) Sports Stadiums. #budget #investment #fundings #banks #projects #infrastructure /fiinews.com
