Industry body the Associated Chambers of Commerce & Industry of India (Assocham) in its latest assessment has said that in the face of slow global demand for merchandise, India’s exports in the current financial year are likely to stay flat or may even move backward of $ 310 billion, the figure achieved in 2014-15, which itself was lower against a target of $ 340 billion for 2014-15 fiscal.
The industry body has further noted that, while it has been a weak trend since July 2014, exports have been witnessing contractions since January this year right through April. Engineering products, gems and jewellery and petroleum products are the biggest contributors to the overall export basket in terms of value. In the previous fiscal, while engineering goods registered a modest increase, the other two segments have been witnessing sharp drop. It further stated that the trend is likely to continue at least for gems and jewellery, while the situation may somewhat stabilize for the petroleum segment since after seeing a sharp fall, the crude oil prices have stopped seeing much of drop. Petroleum exports are related to the prices of crude oil.
Assocham’s paper has also said that going forward, the merchandise exports are likely to average around $22-25 billion a month till the end of second quarter of the current fiscal. The shipments would improve thereafter, but the upside remains limited, the paper noted with concern. However, the impact of the flat or some drop in exports would not have major impact on the trade balance since imports too would remain in muted form because of the poor consumption demand in the domestic Indian economy. Imports too would remain between $440-450 billion in the current fiscal ---more or less in sync with the previous year.
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