Govt to push exports of select electronic items: Minister

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SME Times News Bureau | 14 Jul, 2020
As part of the Atmanirbhar Bharat mission, the government plans to push domestic manufacturing of certain electronic items where India could quickly build scale and increase exports.

Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal said, here on Tuesday, his ministry was looking at identifying select electronic items that could be manufactured in India on a large scale, like television sets, close circuit TVs and air conditioners, and could be exported in large quantities.

While interacting with members of the Electronics and Computer Software Export Promotion Council (ESC) through a conference call, the Minister urged the industry to give specific suggestions regarding such products and the policy tooling required to make them competitive. The government would help in creating conducive ecosystem for such products to be manufactured and exported, he said.

It came as a response to the ESC suggestion that since focus on mobile handset production has paid off in terms of increasing exports, several other electronic products could also deliver similar results with support from the government.

While calling upon the electronics hardware sector to use the innovation, R&D and disruption route to expand domestic footprint and raise exports, Goyal said industries that were more self-reliant and try to grow without the government support had made their mark. In this regard, he pointed to IT, ITeS and BPO sectors that had created a formidable position as a solution provider and exporter.

Depending exclusively on incentives, such as the Exports from India Scheme (MEIS), the Minister said might not add to the competitiveness since such schemes were time-bound and export competitiveness should come from inherent strengths.

He also underscored the need for joint industry-government efforts to implement the National Mission on Quantum Technologies & Applications (NM-QTA), used for engineering solutions to extremely complex problems in computing, communications, sensing, chemistry, cryptography, imaging and mechanics.

Referring to another ESC suggestion that quality and accurate data for software and services exports must be ensured, Goyal said his ministry would take up this with the Reserve Bank of India to tone up the process and procedure of data collation. Some schemes would be put in place to address this issue soon, he added.

Goyal called upon the industry to bring to the government's notice genuine problems being faced by them.

On the issue of MSMEs facing problems in availing the recently announced incentives, he said, "To the best of our knowledge, such schemes are working well, provided the industry complies with the banks' requirements; yet in case of any genuine difficulties, if brought to the notice, timely action will be taken."

The Minister also unveiled the strategic paper, prepared by ESC for augmenting exports of electronics hardware and computer software. The papers contain several proactive suggestions to accelerate exports from these two areas.