Piyush Goyal says India's goods, services exports may cross US $750 billion this fiscal despite global uncertainties

Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal on Saturday said India's goods and services exports are expected to cross US $750 billion this fiscal despite the global economic uncertainties.

In 2021-22, the country's goods and services exports touched an all-time high of US $422 billion and US $254 billion respectively, taking the total shipments to USD 676 billion.

"Last year we crossed a record USD 650 billion of goods and services (exports). This year, we are aiming for an even bigger record. We have crossed last year's figure already in February. We will hopefully cross USD 750 billion (this year)," Piyush Goyal said while speaking at the Raisina Dialogue here.

Due to the global demand slowdown, India's exports contracted for the second consecutive month in January, dipping by 6.6 per cent to USD 32.91 billion.

During April-January this fiscal, goods shipments rose by 8.5 per cent to USD 369.25 billion, while services exports were estimated at USD 272 billion in the period.

The minister said that sectors that would help in promoting exports include manufactured goods, agri products, labour-intensive items, and high-quality products.

He expressed confidence that by 2030, India's goods and services exports would touch USD 2 trillion.

Responding to a question on India achieving the highest export figure in the past year, the minister said that it was the result of a deep-dive analysis and extensive planning where India's capabilities were thoroughly assessed, new markets were sought out, districts, especially remote ones were empowered to become export hubs and all Indian Missions abroad were effectively leveraged to promote trade.

Replying to a question about widening trade deficit with China, he stressed that with the high levels of investments coming into manufacturing in India, India had been succeeding in producing high quality goods and services at competitive prices, rapidly reducing reliance on imports.

He added that until 2000-01, Indo-China total trade was about USD 1 billion and even till 2004, the trade was probably in the range of USD 4 billion and the trade deficit was about USD 1 billion.

"After 2004, almost an outreach was done to engage more with China, to attract Chinese goods into the country in a big way. I do not want to politicise this subject. But between 2004 and 2014, we saw trade grow very very rapidly and the trade deficit went up by nearly 35 times," Goyal said.

He said that the previous governments should be held accountable for the jump in the trade deficit with China.

"But the nation has held them accountable for more than one occasion already and will probably continue to do that," he said, adding the earlier regime in India actually decimated Indian manufacturing capability and it never allowed Indian manufacturing to flourish.

However, now the government is creating that ecosystem to boost domestic manufacturing, he said.

"We are working on bringing quality consciousness to the country," the minister said. During April-December 2022-23, India's exports to China stood at USD 11 billion, while imports were aggregated at USD 75.9 billion. The trade deficit stood at USD 64.9 billion.

On the semiconductor industry, he said a big announcement has already been made to set up a semiconductor facility in Gujarat and many other semiconductor companies around the world are in dialogue with the ministry of electronics and information technology.

On free trade agreements, he said that negotiations are going on very well with countries including the UK, and Canada.

"We are on the right path and these agreements have to be equitable and win-win for both," Goyal said.

Further, he said that the government was focusing extensively on bringing in quality consciousness through various initiatives such as Quality Control Orders (QCOs).

The minister also mentioned that the number of QCOs had grown by over four times and stands at about 440 products now and in the next two years, it would grow up to 2000.

Goyal also said that India would soon touch the mark of being a USD 5 trillion economy and added that it would emerge as the third-largest economy in the world by 2027-28.

"By 2047, India will be a developed economy with a USD 32 trillion economy...India could even dream of building a USD 40 trillion economy by 2047," he added.

With PTI Inputs