Concerned over the declining India’s export, the government announced a slew of measures including sops for Special Economic Zones (SEZs) and extension of the popular EPCG scheme to all sectors to boost shipments. The Commerce Minister, while announcing the incentives as a part of annual supplement to the Foreign Trade Policy (FTP), said that the Export Promotion Capital Goods (EPCG) scheme, which allows exporters to import capital goods at zero duty, would be extended beyond March 2013 and would be applicable to all sectors. Further, the scheme would also merge with 3 per cent EPCG scheme. Beside this, textile exporters will also get the combined scheme of zero-duty EPCG scheme and the technology upgradation fund scheme.
The exports declined by 1.76% to $300.6 billion during 2012-13, which were the first ever decline since 2009-10. The declining exports which missed the government target of $360 billion by a wide margin also pushed up the trade deficit during the fiscal to $190.91 billion from $183.4 billion in the previous financial year.
Regarding the Special Economic Zone (SEZ) Scheme, Sharma said that the minimum land area requirement for setting up such zones has been reduced to half and there would be no ceiling for IT and ITeS SEZs. There would be no minimum land requirement for setting up IT/ITeS SEZs and only minimum built up area criteria would be needed to be met by SEZ developer, the Minister said.
However, the measures announced by the government to boost exports and revive SEZs have received a mixed response from the industry. The apex export body, the Federation of Indian Export organisations (FIEO), said that the foreign trade policy lacked big-ticket reforms announcements. The FIEO was expecting $ 2 billion Export Development Fund (EDF) in this annual FTP.
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