Govt takes several steps to boost outbound shipments: Sitharaman

12 Feb 2020 Evaluate

In a bid to boost country’s outbound shipments, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman has asserted the government has taken several steps, including tax refund scheme and enhanced credit to exporters. Sitharaman said that Remission of Duties or Taxes on Export Product (RoDTEP) scheme will replace the existing Merchandise from India Scheme (MEIS), which is considered as non-compliant to global trade rules. She said textiles and all other sectors, which currently enjoy incentives up to 2 per cent over MEIS, will transit to RoDTEP.

In order to boost credit to export sectors, she said that the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has enhanced the sanctioned limit to the eligible under priority lending norms. The limit has been raised from Rs 25 crore to Rs 40 crore per borrower. Furthermore, the existing criterion of units having a turnover of up to Rs 100 crore has been totally removed. So, it is applicable to anybody who wants to approach and take this priority sector lending. The government has also announced Nirvik (Niryat Rin Vikas Yojana) scheme to provide enhanced insurance cover and reduce premium for small exporters. She said this scheme will expand the scope of export credit and it will offer high insurance cover.

This will enable reduction in overerall cost of export credit, including interest rates speciality to the MSMEs. Further, she said that the government has approved a sugar export policy for evacuation of surplus stocks during the sugar season 2019-20. This shall involve providing lump sum export subsidy of Rs 10,448 crore per tonne to sugar mills. The total estimated expenditure is about Rs 6,268 crore that will be incurred for this purpose. The country's exports contracted for a fifth month in a row by 1.8 per cent in December 2019 to $27.36 billion. During April-December 2019-20, exports slipped 1.96 per cent to $239.29 billion, imports declined 8.9 per cent to $357.39 billion, leaving a trade deficit of $118.10 billion.

© 2026 The Alchemists Ark Pvt. Ltd. All rights reserved. MoneyWorks4Me ® is a registered trademark of The Alchemists Ark Pvt. Ltd.

×