by admin | May 25, 2021 | Corporate, Corporate Governance
Suresh Prabhu
New Delhi : The Union Commerce Ministry has decided to make the country’s districts as the operative unit as part of a revamped strategy for boosting exports that would incentivise the states, and has asked them to appoint nodal officers at district level towards this end, Commerce Minister Suresh Prabhu said on Monday.
Briefing reporters here following a meeting of the Council for Trade Development and Promotion (CTDP), including states’ representatives, he said that with states being well aware of their responsibility in this area, it had been decided that all of them should have their individual export policies.
“We have decided to make the district as the unit for exports, rather than the state. We are in the process of preparing a strategy whereby 40 per cent of our GDP should come from global trade and half of that from exports,” he said.
“India needs to incentivise states to promote exports. We have asked the states to appoint at least one nodal officer at the district level, which is the closest to the local market,” the Minister said, elaborating that although the Centre is responsible for the country’s foreign trade, the actual sourcing is done at the state and local levels.
Noting that it had been decided that all states should have an export policy, Prabhu said 14 states, including Gujarat, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Jharkhand, Assam, Tripura and Manipur had already prepared policies, while Goa, Delhi and Sikkim are about to start preparing theirs.
“The idea of incentivising states has just been mooted, we have not worked out any package. States are feeling responsibility because they will only be benefiting from increased exports,” he said.
Prabhu also said that with the high logistics costs in India affecting export competitiveness, the his ministry is also looking at the sector being handled by a separate ministry.
“We’re working at making logistics a separate subject that could be handled independently by a ministry,” he said.
He also released two booklets on the occasion that have been prepared by the Department of Commerce. One is an analysis of state exports, while the other is a report on the logistics situation across states.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Business, Economy, Large Enterprise, News, Politics
Nitin Gadkari
New Delhi : With logistics cost in India alarmingly high, the government is working towards lowering it by a third by developing coastal shipping and inland waterways as alternative modes of transport, Union Shipping Minister Nitin Gadkari said on Saturday.
In his address at “World Food India 2017” here, he said the logistics cost in India was as high as 18 per cent compared to China where it was between 8 and 10 per cent.
“We are trying to bring this cost down to around 12 per cent which would make Indian goods more competitive in the international market,” Gadkari said, adding that the government was prioritising coastal transport and inland waterways compared to road and rail mode as costs were significantly lower for the former.
“For every Rs 10 of transportation cost by road, it is Rs 6 for railways and only Rs 1 for waterways. That means you would be able to transport goods spending only 10 per cent of the current cost,” said Gadkari, who is also the Road Transport and Highways Minister.
“There are 111 rivers which we have decided to develop as inland waterways. Out of these, work has already started on 10 rivers,” he said. “These waterways will significantly reduce logistics cost.”
Even as the government was focusing on developing waterways, work was simultaneously being done at a fast pace to bring down logistics cost on roads as well, the minister said.
“We are going for electronic toll collection. Currently, Delhi to Mumbai takes 28 hours but soon, it will take only 18 hours because we are abolishing all state barriers. Now we will have e-toll collection and no one will be stopped for paying the toll tax, which will be charged automatically.
“This will lead to saving of 8-10 hours between Delhi and Mumbai,” Gadkari said.
“Our focus is also on logistics parks. We have already acquired land for 32 such parks and all major cities will have them,” he said.
Gadkari added that all logistics parks would be located outside the city where big trucks would arrive with goods, after which smaller vehicles would take those goods to different parts of the city based on requirement.
He said in the road sector alone, his target was to bring in investment worth Rs 25 lakh-crore during his tenure.
“We have already signed contracts worth over Rs 6 lakh-crore in road sector. Under Bharatmala project, we are expecting Rs 8-lakh-crore investment.
“I am confident that in two years, we will meet that target,” Gadkari said.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Corporate, Corporate Buzz
Bengaluru, (IANS) Leading e-tailer Flipkart’s logistics arm Ekart on Thursday launched courier service to deliver parcels to its customers and streamline the fragmented courier market across the country.
As the largest logistics firm since inception in 2009, Ekart delivers goods through its courier service across 3,800 pin codes, with pick-ups in eight cities slated by June.
“The service will allow users to drop a pin for pick-up and delivery addresses on our mapping platform, which will soon have RFID (radio frequency identification and global positioning system (GPS) for real-time tracking of the courier’s journey,” Ekart said in a statement here.
The service also offers consumers benefit of 24×7 online booking on mobile and website, slotted door-step pick-up, free packaging, pricing and delivery time.
“Consumers have experience of our service through our e-commerce deliveries and value reliability, convenience and speed that we bring in. Ekart courier is an extension of this re-assurance,” said Flipkart vice-president Amitesh Jha.
The estimated growth of the domestic courier industry across segments is pegged at Rs.22,000 crore by 2016-17 of which about 50 percent is structured, with global brands accounting for 12 percent of the overall market share.
