SME Times News Bureau | 21 Dec, 2019
Union Minister for Commerce and Industry Piyush Goyal met
with all Export Promotion Councils (EPCs), Federation of Indian Export Organisation
(FIEO) and Commodity Boards under the Department of Commerce, Ministry of
Commerce and Industry.
In a marathon five-hour meeting held on Thursday in New
Delhi, Piyush Goyal reviewed and sought inputs from EPCs for the Foreign Trade
Policy and get their views on steps that may be taken to boost India’s exports.
Pre-budget inputs from EPCs was also taken so that they may
be sent to the Finance Ministry.
Thirty-seven EPCs, FIEO and three Commodity Boards of the
Department of Commerce attended the meeting and took this opportunity to
discuss with Commerce and Industry Minister each and every issue that the
Councils are facing while exporting merchandise and services and also give
their feedback on the various initiatives that are being taken by the Ministry
of Commerce and Industry to ease lending and credit availability to exporters.
The EPCs also gave their views on India’s FTAs/ PTAs with
other countries especially ASEAN.
The problem of exporters identified as “risky exporters” by
CBIC was taken up and Commerce and Industry Minister directed that a nodal
officer be appointed in the office of Directorate General of Foreign Trade
(DGFT).
He urged the Councils to send a list of those identified as
risky exporters to the nodal officer in DGFT so that this issue may be taken up
with the Finance Ministry. Councils were directed to send this list by 31st
December 2019 to Additional DGFT, Vijay Kumar.
The Commerce Minister further suggested that rationalization
of EPCs must be taken up in order to avoid duplication of work and suggested
that the big exporters may continue to be part of FIEO and smaller Councils may
merge with bigger EPCs that deal with products of similar nature.
Commerce and Industry Minister urged the EPCs to study the
non-tariff barriers (NTB) being faced by them while exporting to other
countries so that a study may be done to look at these NTBs and take up this
issue by laterally with the countries especially with whom India has FTAs/
PTAs.
Commerce and Industry Minister urged exporters to make use of
the NIRVIK (Niryat Rin Vikas Yojana) Scheme that will soon be approved by
Cabinet so that exporters are able to access easy lending and enhanced loan
availability that will cover 90% of the principle interest and will also include
both pre and post shipment credit.
Director General and CEO of FIEO, Dr Ajay Sahai suggested
that the New Foreign Trade Policy should study profile of our exports as well
as global imports trends as India is largely exporting textiles, leather,
handicraft, carpets, marine and agro products.
While these are important for employment their share in
global exports is in decline.
The top 5 products in global exports, accounting for over
50%, are electrical & electronic products, petroleum goods, machinery, automobile
and plastic goods.
However, their share in India’s exports is less than 33%.
India’s global share in these 5 products, put together, is about 1%. Therefore,
the New FTP should facilitate the export of these products suggested Dr. Sahai.
The issue of India’s low share in high technology exports was
also discussed by FIEO. High technology exports accounts for 6.3% of our
exports, whereas the same is 29% for China, 32% for South Korea, 34% for
Vietnam, 39% for Singapore. (India USD 20 billion, Malaysia
USD 90 billion, Singapore USD 155 billion, South Korea USD 192 billion, China
USD 652 billion).
The specific issues and problems being faced by certain EPCs
like Telecom, Forest Produce and Shellac Export Promotion Council, Sports Goods
EPC and CAPEXIL will be taken up with other line Ministries assured the
Minister so that these issues and problems may be sorted out as soon as
possible.
At the end of the meeting, it was decided by the Minister, in
concurrence with all EPCs and Boards that another meeting will be held after
the Budget in February 2020 to review the tasks achieved and those still
pending, that were discussed in yesterday’s meeting.
All EPCs and Commodity Boards express their appreciation for
time given by Minister of Commerce and Industry to hear out even the smallest
of their problems and the prompt manner in which someone of them were disposed
of during the course of the meeting and the assurance given by the Minister to
solve the long standing issues of certain EPCs.
Commerce Secretary and other senior officers of both
Department of Commerce and Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal
Trade were present at the meeting.