Merchandise exports to surpass $314 bn peak this year; pharma, engineering, petroleum products contribute to growth

Hyderabad: The country’s merchandise exports in the current fiscal are expected to surpass the earlier peak of $314 billion in 2013-14, a senior official said Monday. “This year, we are very confident that we will go past our earlier peak, our earlier peak of 2013-14. We will go past that peak quite comfortably this year,” Union commerce secretary Anup Wadhawan told reporters here. The earlier peak was $314 billion, he said. The achievement comes against the backdrop of a very challenging global environment, Wadhawan said. [caption id=“attachment_1986167” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] Representational image. Reuters.[/caption] “The earlier peak was 314 billion. We will be comfortably beyond that. Mind you, that is in a very, very challenging global environment. It’s an environment where petroleum prices are coming down and 15 percent of our exports are petroleum products. So, in spite of that, we are going to achieve a new peak,” he said. The exports, in general, have been growing almost consistently for the last three years, he said. “In fact, you all know about the downturn of 2008-09 when there was a financial crisis, that hit us quite badly. But then we recovered from that. We reached a peak figure of our exports in 2013-14 and then as you know that global crisis got accentuated,” Wadhawan said. “The real economy got affected and you saw, countries like China and all also getting affected for the first time. Then again, there were couple of years of slight downturn,” he said. After that, for the last three years, the country’s exports were growing, he added. Pharma, engineering products, petroleum products, gems and jewellery, leather products and even textiles would be among sectors that contribute to the growth in the exports, Wadhawan said. “India is doing better, because of lot of effort which has been put into it, effort on the policy side, effort on the regulatory side, in terms of ease of doing business, in terms of simplification of procedures. There are so many interventions, starting with making credit available at affordable rates…,” Wadhawan said. He also said the current account deficit (CAD) is well under control. “Current account is under control, thanks to the fact that exports are growing and then petroleum prices have also stabilised to some extent and are falling in the recent months… I think the economy is in good shape,” he said. An export strategy is in place with the government listening to the exporters and addressing their problems, he said. He hoped the IT exports would grow at around 10 percent which has been the trend for many years. “The fact that we are dominant today (in IT), will in many ways, logically mean that we will remain dominant tomorrow also. So, certainly, I see a good future for Indian IT,” he said. Replying to a query, he said the country’s exports to China and the US are doing well and that the trade issues between the two countries also to some extent contributed to India’s cause.