Keen to give a helping hand to exporters before they get hit by the turbulent global scenario, the government is set to announce a few changes in the foreign trade policy.
Commerce and industry minister Anand Sharma, commerce secretary Rahul Khullar and director general of foreign trade Anup Pujari met the heads of export promotion councils (EPCs) of different commodities here on Friday.
The meeting followed the half-yearly sectoral review undertaken by the government to address the challenges faced by the exporters.
As demand is expected to dry out, Sharma said the government has assured exporters of fiscal support as early as within the next 10 days. Sources said the sops will be announced on October 13.Though the country’s exports have shown a robust growth of 54% during April-August, the trend is difficult to maintain in the backdrop of the demand slowdown in the US and Europe.
The World Trade Organization (WTO) has also lowered the projections for the global exports growth to 6% in 2011, against 14% expansion last year.
When asked if the announcement of sops would amount to an yearly review of the existing foreign trade policy 2009-2014, Khullar said, “It is not a review but a tweaking in the policy, keeping in mind the global scenario.” However, he did not divulge the monetary value of the sops.