FOREIGN TRADE POLICY STATEMENT 2015-20

INDIA’S ELECTRONICS AND SOFTWARE INDUSTRY AND EXPORT

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FOREIGN TRADE POLICY 2015-20: KEY HIGHLIGHTS

Executive Summary
Vision, Mission And Objectives

The FTP for 2015-2020 seeks to provide a stable and sustainable policy environment for foreign trade in merchandise and services; link rules, procedures and incentives for exports and imports with other initiatives such as „Make in India‟, „Digital India‟ and „Skills India‟ to create an „Export Promotion Mission‟; promote the diversification of India‟s export basket by helping various sectors of the Indian economy to gain global competitiveness; create an architecture for India‟s global trade engagement with a view to expanding its markets and better integrating with major regions, thereby increasing the demand for India‟s products and contributing to the „Make in India‟ initiative; and to provide a mechanism for regular appraisal in order to rationalise imports and reduce the trade imbalance.

Whole-of-government‟ Approach & Role Of State/ut Governments

A major path breaking initiative taken by the Department of Commerce, which can have far reaching benefits if properly executed, is to mainstream State and Union Territory (UT) Governments and various Departments and Ministries of the Government of India in the process of international trade. State/UT Governments can play a crucial role in promoting exports and rationalising non-essential imports. Many of the State Governments have nominated Export Commissioners. The Department of Commerce is also helping State Governments to prepare export strategies. An Export Promotion Mission will be constituted to provide an institutional framework to work with State Governments to boost India‟s exports. Senior officials have been appointed as designated focal points for exports and imports in several Central Government departments.

ESC offers a varied set of services to its members for accelerating exports.

The New Foreign Trade Policy 2015-20 was announced by Minister of Commerce & Industry Mrs. Nirmala Sitharaman, at Vigyan Bhawan. The new five year Foreign Trade Policy, 2015-20 provides a framework for increasing exports of goods and services as well as generation of employment and increasing value addition in the country, in keeping with the “Make in India” vision of Prime Minister. The focus of the new policy is to support both the manufacturing and services sectors, with a special emphasis on improving the ‘ease of doing business’.

During her address Mrs. Sitharaman stated that there were various forces shaping India and its equation with the rest of the world. She urged the Government and industry to work in tandem to deal with the challenges posed. The release of Foreign Trade Policy was also accompanied by a FTP Statement explaining the vision, goals and objectives underpinning India’s Foreign Trade Policy, laying down a road map for India’s global trade engagement in the coming years. The FTP Statement describes the market and product strategy and measures required for trade promotion, infrastructure development and overall enhancement of the trade eco system. It seeks to enable India to respond to the challenges of the external environment, keeping in step with a rapidly evolving international trading architecture and make trade a major contributor to the country’s economic growth and development. She promised to have regular interactions with all stakeholders, including State Governments to achieve the national objectives.

Ftp2015-20. introduces two new schemes, namely “Merchandise Exports from India Scheme (MEIS)” for export of specified goods to specified markets and “Services Exports from India Scheme (SEIS)” for increasing exports of notified services, in place of a plethora of schemes earlier, with different conditions for eligibility and usage. There would be no conditionality attached to any scrips issued under these schemes. Duty credit scrips issued under MEIS and SEIS and the goods imported against these scrips are fully transferable. For grant of rewards under MEIS, the countries have been categorized into 3 Groups, whereas the rates of rewards under MEIS range from 2% to 5%. Under SEIS the selected Services would be rewarded at the rates of 3% and 5%.

Measures have been adopted to nudge procurement of capital goods from indigenous manufacturers under the EPCG scheme by reducing specific export obligation to 75% of the normal export obligation. This will promote the domestic capital goods manufacturing industry. Such flexibilities will help exporters to develop their productive capacities for both local and global consumption. Measures have been taken to give a boost to exports of defense and hi-tech items. At the same time e-Commerce exports of handloom products, books/periodicals, leather footwear, toys and customized fashion garments through courier or foreign post office would also be able to get benefit of MEIS (for values upto 25,000 INR). These measures would not only capitalize on India’s strength in these areas and increase exports but also provide employment. Commerce Minister stated that although exports from SEZs had seen phenomenal growth, significantly higher than the overall export growth of the country, in recent times they had been facing several challenges. In order to give a boost to exports from SEZs, government has now decided to extend benefits of both the reward schemes (MEIS and SEIS) to units located in SEZs. It is hoped that this measure will give a new impetus to development and growth of SEZs in the country.

Trade facilitation and enhancing the ease of doing business are the other major focus areas in this new FTP. One of the major objective of new FTP is to move towards paperless working in 24×7 environment. Recently, the government has reduced the number of mandatory documents required for exports and imports to three, which is comparable with international benchmarks. Now, a facility has been created to upload documents in exporter/importer profile and the exporters will not be required to submit documents repeatedly. Attention has also been paid to simplify various ‘Aayat Niryat’ Forms, bringing in clarity in different provisions, removing ambiguities and enhancing electronic governance. Manufacturers, who are also status holders, will now be enabled to self certify their manufactured goods in phases, as originating from India with a view to qualifying for preferential treatment under various forms of bilateral and regional trade agreements. This “Approved Exporter System” will help these manufacturer exporters considerably in getting fast access to international markets.

A number of steps have been taken for encouraging manufacturing and exports under 100% EOU/EHTP/STPI/BTP Schemes. The steps include a fast track clearance facility for these units, permitting them to share infrastructure facilities, permitting inter unit transfer of goods and services, permitting them to set up warehouses near the port of export and to use duty free equipment for training purposes. Considering the strategic significance of small and medium scale enterprise in the manufacturing sector and in employment generation, ‘MSME clusters’ 108 have been identified for focused interventions to boost exports. Accordingly, ‘Niryat Bandhu Scheme’ has been galvanized and repositioned to achieve the objectives of ‘Skill India’. Outreach activities will be organized in a structured way at these clusters with the help of EPCs and other willing “Industry Partners” and “Knowledge Partners”.

INDIA’S ELECTRONICS AND SOFTWARE INDUSTRY AND EXPORT

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FOREIGN TRADE POLICY 2015-20: KEY HIGHLIGHTS

ESC offers a varied set of services to its members for accelerating exports.

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