Engineering exporters disappointed over stimulus plan

Aman Chadha, chairman, EEPC India, said he was deeply disappointed over the lack of initiative to support the engineering sector in the measures being announced by the government on December 7, 2008.

He said that the engineering exports growth was a mere 0.8% in October 2008, which fell from an average 20% growth in 2007-08 and accounted for 4 million workers in the country.

To deny support measures to the engineering sector on the ground that it was the only segment which had positive growth hides the fact that at a disaggregated level, a range of engineering industries have faced negative rates of growth of 20%.

These include sectors like auto components, hand tools, machine tools, bicycle and parts as well as certain general engineering segments.

Chadha felt that unless engineering sector is also supported by specific measures, around 4-6 lakh workers could be affected, particularly, in the SME sector.

Chadha said that the Council is in the process of collecting data from its members and will thereafter make a representation to the government so that severely handicapped engineering sectors are given support as is being done for textiles and other related sectors.

The Special Task Force of the Council will be meeting on December 10 at Mumbai to look at the measures announced by the government and draw up future plans for action to ensure that engineering sectors which have been badly hit are also supported by government initiatives.