Base effect, recovery boosts India's engineering goods exports in April

India's engineering goods exports to 23 key markets, including the US, China and Germany recorded positive year-on-year growth in April 2021, EEPC India said on Saturday.

According to the council, overall merchandise trade from the country surged primarily on account of base effect.

Last year's corresponding period had seen exports plummet as outbreak of coronavirus disrupted the supply chain globally.

"All the product groups other than 'ships, boats and floating structures' recorded positive growth during this period. The growth momentum has continued for the past few months despite Covid shadow," said Mahesh Desai, Chairman, EEPC India.

"The high growth rate in outbound shipment is mainly due to the low base of FY21 but recovery is indeed impressive. It mirrors global trends."

EEPC India's data showed that engineering goods exports in April soared 229.74 per cent in value terms to $7.60 billion from $2.31 billion in the corresponding month last year.

Presently, engineering goods account for about one-fourth of the total merchandise exports from India and therefore it has significantly contributed to the recovery in the country's external trade.

As per the data, among the top 25 export destinations for India's engineering goods, negative growth was seen only in the case of Malaysia and Singapore.

Besides, the US continued to be the biggest market for India's engineering goods exporters followed by China.

"While exports to the US jumped more than 400 per cent year-on-year in April this fiscal, shipments to India's second largest export destination China clocked monthly growth of 143.3 per cent during this period," the statement said.

Furthermore, the data showed that amongst the 32 engineering goods categories which posted positive growth, exports of iron and steel recorded a massive jump of 210 per cent in April 2021 compared to the same period last year.

"Non-ferrous segment as a whole comprising aluminium, zinc, nickel, lead, tin and other products witnessed 110.5 per cent growth in exports during this period."

"Within industrial machinery, overall there has been growth in monthly exports to the extent of 703 per cent from $146.21 million in April 2020 to $1174.23 million in April 2021."

In terms of electrical machinery, exports increased from $245.43 million in April 2020 to $853.1 million in April 2021 witnessing a growth of more than 247 per cent unlike the pattern observed in the previous months.

"Exports of aircraft, spacecraft and parts exhibited positive monthly growth by more than 200 per cent in April 2021 scaling up from $24.1 million in April 2020 to $74.5 million in April 2021."

"Exports of ships, boats and floating structures was the only engineering panel witnessing negative growth to the extent of 32.8 per cent from $677.4 million in April 2020 to $455.4 million in April 2021."

--IANS

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