EEPC wants incentives back

EEPC India, country's apex body of engineering exporters, fears a slump in business owing to the current economic downturn and government's lack of response to the problems facing exports.

Speaking to Business Standard, Rakesh Shah, chairman of EEPC India, pointed out that inspite of appeals to Reserve Bank of India on the continuance of the interest subvention and EEFC interest schemes, there had been no response yet.

Speaking on the bandh called today by CITU, Shah said that the bandh was bound to have a negative effect on business.

Bandhs sent a very negative message to the rest of the world about the level of competitiveness but also meant a day's production loss.

The reputation of West Bengal as a competitive state would suffer badly, he added.

Added to this, the recent hikes in CRR and repo rates had contributed to a total increase of around 5 percent interest to be borne by the exporter community in such dire times, he said.

This would not only affect exports from the country but would lower the competitive value of the Indian exporters in the global market.

EEPC, previously known as Engineering Export Promotion Council, said its members accounted for around 20 per cent of the total exports from India in the last fiscal with shipments of around $33.28 billion in the financial year ending March 2008.

Shah claimed that engineering exporters would only manage a meagre 5-10 percent growth in terms of volume compared to the robust growth it achieved the previous fiscal of close to 30 percent. However, growth in the first quarter had been reasonably good with the total value of engineering exports touching $8.72 billion, up 23 per cent in dollar terms and 22 per cent in rupee terms.