FICCI-FIEO support Govt decision

Duty free imports from China, which has economy of scale, and sitting on huge inventory and capacity, could have jolted the manufacturing beyond recovery and thus crippling exports, said FIEO President Sharad Kumar Saraf in welcoming the government’s decision on the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) on 4 Nov 2019.

A vibrant manufacturing holds the key to exports, he underlined, and pleaded to the government to make manufacturing competitive by reducing the cost of credit, bringing down logistics cost, rebating all state taxes and levies and addressing inverted duty structure.

Reacting to the government’s decision to stay out of RCEP for now on 5 Nov 2019, he suggested that the share of manufacturing in GDP should go up by one percentage point every year so that we increase its share to 25% in the next 10 years.

In the same tone, FICCI President Sandip Somany said, “We at FICCI fully support Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s decision against joining RCEP, as India’s several concerns remain unaddressed and various issues are unresolved so far in the proposed deal under negotiation.

In recent months serious apprehensions and reservations on RCEP have been expressed by a large number of sectors including steel, plastics, copper, aluminium, machine tools, paper, automobiles, chemicals, petro-chemicals and others, he pointed out in 5 Nov 2019.

Further, there were not enough positive developments in the area of trade in services including easier mobility for Indian professionals and service-providers.

“I compliment Prime Minister Narendra Modi for taking a very pragmatic decision towards safeguarding the interest of Indian industry and the country as a whole,” said Somany. fiinews.com