The Confederation of Indian Textile Industry (CITI) has welcomed the announcement made by Mr. Anand Sharma, Minister for Commerce, Industry and Textiles, while releasing the Annual Supplement 2013-14 to the Foreign Trade Policy 2009-14.
In a statement, Mr. S.V. Arumugam, CITI Chairman, has observed that extending the zero duty EPCG Scheme benefit to the TUFS beneficiaries is a request that the industry has been making for quite sometime. He thanked the Minister for accepting this request, as also the extension of 2% interest subvention on export credit upto March 31, 2014 and inclusion of made-ups for this benefit.
Expansion of coverage of Focus Schemes both in terms of products and markets would benefit textile exporters significantly. Textile exports are on a recovery path currently, and therefore extension of the Incremental Export Incentivisation Scheme to 2013-14 and inclusion of 53 additional countries under the Scheme would also help exporters in this sector substantially.
Mr. Arumugam has also welcomed the procedural simplifications and the focus on reducing the transaction cost in the Annual Supplement which he termed a substantially positive package for the textile and clothing sector.