With an aim to promote seamless movement of goods across the country and reduce high transaction cost of traders, the commerce ministry will soon seek Cabinet nod for its national logistics policy. The proposed policy will focus on increasing the warehousing capacity, and identify gaps that could be bridged to bring down the cost of logistics for traders. The ministry has already circulated a draft Cabinet note on the policy seeking views of different ministries and departments on the same. After getting the views, the department of commerce would finalise the note and seek Cabinet's approval.
High logistics cost impacts competitiveness of domestic goods in the international markets. The commerce ministry is working on several steps, including development of a national logistics portal to boost both domestic and foreign trade. The main departments involved in the process include Railways, Shipping, Road Transport, Civil Aviation and Customs. The plan will map the logistics requirements keeping in mind 2035 as the target year. It would also align infrastructure development of various central ministries with one another.
Promoting exports helps a country to create jobs, boost manufacturing and earn more foreign exchange. The commerce ministry is developing the national logistics portal as a single window market place to link all stakeholders, and preparing an integrated strategy to reduce cost of exports, imports and domestic trade. The Department of Logistics, under the ministry, also inked a memorandum of understanding with Indian institute of Foreign Trade (IIFT) to set up a centre for logistics. The cost of logistics for India is about 14% of its GDP and it is far higher as compared to other countries.