The Hindu : Business : Jewellery exports rise to $16 b

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Apr 21, 2005

Business

Business

Jewellery exports rise to $16 b

Special Correspondent

The sector employs 13 lakh jobs and can add three lakh jobs every year

Issues such as transfer pricing, service tax, excise on branded jewellery, value added tax and others need immediate attention by the Union Commerce Ministry.

IMPRESSIVE GROWTH: The Chairman of Gem & Jewellery Export Promotion Council, Bakul Mehta (right), with the Director General of Foreign Trade, K. T. Chacko, addressing a press conference in New Delhi on Wednesday. — Photo: Ramesh Sharma

NEW DELHI: With gems and jewellery exports rising by a steep 29.27 per cent to $15.6 billion in 2004-05, the target for the current year has been raised to $18 billion.

Disclosing this here today, the Chairman of the Gem and Jewellery Export Promotion Council, Bakul R. Mehta, said the export target for 2004-05 had been pegged at $13.3 billion. At this rate, he felt that the industry was close to achieving the target of $20 billion by 2007.

He told newspersons that the industry had shown impressive growth in the last financial year, especially in the jewellery sector, which was the future of the industry. He noted that there were issues such as transfer pricing, service tax, excise on branded jewellery, value added tax and others that needed immediate attention by the Union Commerce Ministry. He felt that if these were attended to, it would not be difficult to achieve the export target set for 2006-07.

He said the GJEPC was also setting up a Bharat Diamond Bourse in Mumbai, which would be ready by 2006-07, as part of efforts to make India the world's diamond hub. Highlighting the employment potential of the industry, he said it employed 13 lakh people now and could add three lakh jobs every year in the future. Giving details of exports in this sector, he said cut and polished diamonds, which contributed about 72 per cent of the total exports in this sector, rose by 29.60 per cent to $11.1 billion compared to $8.6 billion in 2003-04. Gold jewellery exports jumped by an impressive 42.2 per cent to $3.81 billion while exports of coloured gemstones increased by 8.1 per cent to $192 million. In rupee terms, total exports stood at Rs. 70,240 crores in 2004-05, up 26.44 per cent from Rs. 55,554 crores a year ago. Total imports of gems and jewellery grew 23.65 per cent to $11.56 billion over $9.3 billion a year ago. Imports of rough diamonds grew 6.3 per cent to $7.59 billion in 2004-05 while imports of cut and polished diamonds jumped by 137.8 per cent to $2.82 billion.

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