'Mfg needs to become globally competitive'

The manufacturing industry needs to grow and become globally competitive so that exports from India outpace the growing imports on account of rising crude oil prices, said Anand Sharma, Union Minister for Commerce and Industry, here on Saturday.

The country’s exports touched $50 billion in the first two months of the current financial year, a record, staying ahead of imports. Sharma said this was possible, among other things, due to a conscious effort in diversifying Indian exports into new markets such as Africa. India has been consistently pursuing free trade pacts with more and more countries and is fully focused on the ‘look east’ policy.

However imports are also growing due to a rise in crude oil prices. “Therefore, it remains our endeavour to make our industry globally competitive,”  Sharma said. Besides, the manufacturing sector alone could create enough jobs for the country’ population, he added.

The government proposes to create mega industrial zones and integrated industrial townships under the new manufacturing policy unveiled by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh recently, according to Sharma.

While uncultivable lands would be the first priority in creating these zones, the proposed smart industrial townships would also take care of the future concerns of environmental sustainability. The minister asked the industry to focus on clean technologies to achieve this end.

These mega zones also will have hubs for incubating technologies in manufacturing.

The minister termed manufacturing, infrastructure and agriculture apart from innovation, adaptation and assimilation of green technologies as the nation’s priorities.

Responding to a question on the state’s request to export rice, he said anything in this regard would be decided only in the light of the food security initiative to be launched soon across the country.