Shipping times June 26 2019.

Steady progress in coastal & port connectivity roads component of Bharatmala Pariyojana .

New Delhi June 25.

Under the coastal and port connectivity roads component of the Bharat Mala pariyojana phase- I programme five road projects with total length of about 163 km and total cost  as Rs. 2.469 crore (approx.) have been awarded till march 2019 in the entire country .progress of all the projects in monitored electronically for ensuring completion as per schedule .

This information was given by the union minister forroad transport and high ways Mr. Nitin Gatkari in a written reply in parliament on Monday.

The Bhatmala Pariyojna phase - I was approved at an estimated outlay of Rs. 5,35,000 crore.. A total of 24.800 km of national highways have been  considered in phase - I as well as 10.000 km residual road works under NHDP under this program the ministry of road Transport and highways has identified stretches fore development of about 9,000 km length of economic corridors about 6.000 km length if inter corridor and feeder roads. about 5.000 km length of national corridors efficiency improvements about  2.000 km  length of border and international connectivity roads  about 2.000 km length of coastal and port connectivity roads and about 800 km length of expressways.

CAUTION URGED ON PHASING OUT EXPORT SUBSIDIES.
six point agenda suggested for making Indian exports competitive.

Exim news  service  New Delhi June 12.

After commerce and industry Minister Mr. Piyush Goyal talked about phasing out export subsidies and asking the trade not to be dependent on them the chairman trade promotion council of India (TPCI) Mr. Mohit sigla has said the governments needs  to take a gradual and cautious  view on this matter as the buyers also negotiated and demanded some part of the subsidy .
While congratulating the Minister  for setting the bail rolling by immediately convening the board of trade and council of trade promotion and development meeting .  Mr. Singla  also suggested a six - point agenda which may be strategized for making Indian exports competitive.
To begin with there is a need to identify a newq product basket that can easily find markets compared to our global competitors as India has an inherent  advantage. The emerging champion sectors could be electrical furniture and mattress and processed food. for  example processed food alone has huge scope after value addition .
Then comes external outreach.and promotion of Indian products to new and emerging markets. India could utilize 80 trade promotion offices working on already accepted global norms for promotion of various products and brands from the country .
The third is creating in a national portal for global trade inquires to be run/ managed by respective export promotion councils which could handle queries on day to day basis.
Fourth could be in concentivisation  above basic target encourage the performers by linking it with performance and target, be it EPC s or nany other body or organisation.
The fifth is the availability of credit for the industry both in terms of intermsdiary and fineshed goods for exports .
Finally reducing the cost and time of port clearance for the goods for export is very important . port charges in India should be reduced as it makes Indian exports  less competitive compared to the rest of the world . Number of days for port clearance and logistics cost per  km of road transport should be also be brought down it was suggested as per a release.

SHIPPING TIMES 12 JUNE 2019.
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New Delhi June 11 Mr Piyush Goyal the commerce and industry Minister has taken a number of major decisions to boost exports and industrial growth.The work on some of these decitions.ranging from fast tracking anti dumping investigations into goods in the micro small and medium enterprises (MSME)category to initiating research on reducing import dependence will begin pretty soon says a report .

Most of the decision received the Ministers nod after he held a 10 hours meeting with export promotion councils industry bodies and officials from the center  and state governments .
In of the major decisions the government has decided to initiate an investigation in to the top 50 tariff lines, constituting  60 per cent of India s importers to find ways to reduce import dependence
Besides officials have been asked to work with  state governments to identify 50 manufacturing  clusters across the country . priority will be given to micro , small and medium enterprises and most clusters will have a mix of various industries  catering to a complete value chain in a particuler geography.

it is learnt many of these clusters will focus on import substitution  especially for goods in the engineering textiles and electronics sectors .

The department for promotion of industry and internal Trade (DPIIT) has been asked to work with industry bodies to organize a national investor promotion event in the next six to nine months while such investment sum mits have mostly focused  on foreign investors this sum mit would give equal importance to domestic investors reports said .

export credit agencies have been directed to shift focus from subsidies to felicitating cheaper availability of loan in foreign currencies to exporters by June 30 2019 .

Similarly both export credit Guarantee corporation of India (ECGC) and exim bank have been told to speedily raise their loan dis bursals to exporters ECGC will enable a credit guarantee  to cover foreign currency lending to MSME while the exim bank will provide refinance in foreign currency to commercial banks to support all exporters . MSME continue to remain a key focus for Mr goyal who has also directed ECGC to extend export factoring for MSME said the export.