The Hindu : Business : AEPC demands higher duty credit facility

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, Apr 08, 2006

Business

Business

AEPC demands higher duty credit facility

Special Correspondent

Wants more products and markets covered

NEW DELHI: The Apparel Export Promotion Council (AEPC) has expressed disappointment that product and market focus schemes, under the new Foreign Trade Policy, would allow a duty credit facility of only 2.5 per cent of the f.o.b. value of exports.

Speaking to The Hindu from Mumbai, AEPC Chairperson, Vijay Kumar Agarwal, said the rebate was too low. It should be at least 10 per cent and should cover a wider range of products and markets.

As per the announcement, the incentive would be offered to only handloom products bearing `handloom mark' and handicraft items under the Focus Product Scheme and for exports to only a select group of countries under the Focus Market Scheme.

The list excludes the U.S. and the EU, which are the main markets for textile exports not only from India, but also worldwide.

The AEPC, he said, was also disappointed that issues relating to un-rebated service tax and fringe benefit tax had not been resolved, despite the need for urgency in the matter.

The issues were of great importance to exporters in making commitments to their buyers.

Overall, he said, the policy was welcome as it tried to at least address several issues of relevance to textile exporters.

The decision to make suppliers of materials to Special Economic Zones entitled for Duty Entitlement Pass Book Scheme was a welcome move and so was the decision to allow flexibility in maintaining average export performance under the EPCG scheme and the move to allow export oriented units in the textile sector to dispose of the left over materials and fabrics up to two per cent of c.i.f. value of imports.

The measures, Mr. Agarwal said, should give a boost to textile exports, though much more needed to be done to achieve the export target of $50 billion by 2010 set by the National Textile Policy of 2000.

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