Foreign Trade Policy mid-term review tomorrow, may address exporters' woes

Key policymakers led by Commerce Minister Suresh Prabhu will unveil the mid-term review of the foreign trade policy here tomorrow, which is likely to address exporters' concerns to arrest the declining trend of shipments.

The mid-review of the much-awaited policy will be released at an event graced by Prabhu, along with top officials including the Directorate General of Foreign Trade Atul Chaturvedi, Commerce Secretary Rita Teaotia and Revenue Secretary Hasmukh Adhia.

Exporters have been voicing concerns about challenges on account of implementation of GST, even suggesting that they be kept out of the ambit of the new indirect tax regime and the drawback refund be expedited as it was blocking their working capital.

The mid-term review was earlier supposed to be released before July 1, in line with the introduction of GST. However, it was put off as the government wanted to factor in the feedback from exporters based on their experience with GST.

Exports entered the negative terrain after over a year, contracting 1.12 per cent in October, primarily due to liquidity problem being faced by exporters following rollout of GST.

The five-year FTP was announced on April 1, 2015, and set an ambitious target of India's goods and services exports touching USD 900 billion by 2020. It also aimed at increasing India's share of world exports to 3.5 per cent, from 2 per cent.