Coir Board for withdrawal of excise duty

The Coir Board has urged the Union finance ministry to withdraw the recently-imposed excise duty of 10 to 16 per cent on coir and coir products.

In a memorandum submitted to the ministry, Board chairman V S Vijayaraghavan explained that the new excise duty would be detrimental to the interests of coir sector at a time when it was struggling to compete with synthetic and other fibre-based products, locally and globally.