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The exports of engineering goods jumped to $81.8 billion during April-December 2021 (provisional) as compared to $52.9 billion during same period in the previous year, registering a growth of 54 per cent, an official release said on Monday (24 January).
The engineering goods sector constitutes the largest, more than 27 per cent, share of India’s total exports basket during the period.
The engineering goods sector comprises of metal products, industrial machinery and equipment, automobiles and its components, transport equipment, bicycles, medical devices and renewable equipment.
As compared to April-December 2019 ($59.8 billion), exports of Engineering Goods registered a growth of 37 per cent while this represents a growth of 49 per cent compared to April-December 2014 ($55 billion), the Commerce Ministry said in a release.
nandakumar wrote:disha
A question arising from your comment on Suraj's article. What exactly is the demand for air purifiers? I thought it is something that people in Delhi use perhaps in increasing numbers. But outside of key Metros? I don't know.
Air purifiers are useful as people increasingly live in more 'closed' indoor settings in high rise urban settings. They are very popular in California where there's an active wildfire season, and in fact there are rebates from utilities for buying and using them. I use them at home.
What disha mentions is a very important topic - to make something as low tech as air purifiers needs a supply chain producing all manner of simple things. The simple chip that can do basic things like timed mode etc, or even premium features like AQ sensors that turn on the speed when the quality drops - it detects cooking in the kitchen and ramps up to max mode temporarily for example. Making something like this is simple. It doesn't need 10nm deep EUV anything - some really cheap but high yield node that is easily leveraged, is sufficient. And the low noise brushless motors. The internal power electrics, even the plastic extrusion... we want to make all these in India, without a question. There's no point on depending on China for these things - the goal of industrialization is to foster all this.
Thanks Suraj, for the clarification. I understand now that every product needs a vibrant component manufacturing base for the product to be successful.
congrats Suraj san,on a well written article in what happens to be the first one in a series of articles. the graphs were particularly helpful in seeing where we lack in exports with respect to other SE Asian economies and what we tend to dominate traditionally.
CAPEX is a massive 35 percent rise from Rs 5.54 lakh crore this year (2021-22) to Rs 7.5 lakh crore in 2022-23. Unbelievable forward thinking
Digital Rupee (CBDC) - Great start.
Export zones - Another forward foundation
A crisp summary of the key points in the budget. Looks like fiscal deficit at 6.4 for next fiscal is pegged very conservatively - any idea if this will mean some room for sops after elections in anticipation of GE?
OT maybe but NYT and Bloomberg both have extremely negative headlines for budget. The Bloomberg guy called Andy Mukherjee seems to be on a 24x7 crusade against Modi/India.
Economy
— Capex target expanded by 35.4 per cent — from Rs 5.54 lakh crore to Rs 7.50 lakh crore. FY23 effective capex seen at Rs 10.7 lakh crore
— India's growth highest among all major economies; we are now in a strong position to withstand challenges
— The goal is complementing macro-growth with micro-all-inclusive welfare, digital economy and fintech, tech-enabled development, energy transition and climate action
— ECLGS cover expanded by Rs 50,000 to Rs 5 lakh crore
— Top focus of the budget this year are: PM Gati Shakti, Inclusive Development, Productivity Enhancement, Sunrise Opportunities, Energy Transition, Climate Action, Financing of investments
— Productivity-linked incentive schemes in 14 sectors have received excellent response; received investment intentions worth Rs 30 lakh crore
— Economic recovery benefitting from public investment and capital spending. This Budget will provide impetus to growth
Taxes
— The government will tax income from digital asset transfers at 30%
— No deduction allowed while computing income except cost of acquisition
— Loss cannot be set off from any other income
— Gift of cryptocurrencies to be taxed at receiver's end
— A new provision to allow taxpayers to file an updated return
— Updated return can be filed within 2 years from the end of the relevant assessment year.
— Alternate Minimum Tax for cooperative societies to be cut to 15%
— Proposal will reduce surcharge on cooperative societies to 7%, for those whose income is between Rs 1 crore and Rs 10 crore
— Tax deduction limit increased to 14% on employers contribution to NPS account of state govt employees
Jobs
— ECLGS extended till March 2023, 60 lakh jobs eyed in next 5 years
— Efforts of central, state governments leading to jobs, entrepreneurial opportunities
— Digital ecosystem for skilling and livelihood to be launched.
— This will aims to skill, reskill, upskill citizens through online training.
— API based skill credentials, payment layers to find relevant jobs and opportunities
Infra
— National highway network to be expanded by 25,000 kms during FY 22-23
— Desh stack e-portal to be launched to promote digital infra
— Strategic transfer of ownership of Air India completed now
— 2,000 kms to be brought under Kavach by FY 22-23
— Four multi-modal national parks contracts will be awarded in FY23
— One product one railway station will be popularised, 400 new Vande Bharat trains to be introduced
— PM Gatishakti masterplan for expressways will be formulated in next financial year
— 100 PM Gati Shakti terminals to be set up in next three years
— Focus on public investment to modernise infrastructure over the medium term, leveraging tech platform of Gati Shakti via a multi-modal approach
— PM Gati Shakti will pull forward the economy and will lead to more jobs and opportunities for the youth
Housing & urban planning
— Rs 48, 000 crore is allotted for PM Awas Yojana
— In 2022-23, 80 lakh houses will be completed for identified beneficiaries of PM Awas Yojana; 60,000 houses will be identified as beneficiaries for PM Awas Yojana in rural & urban areas
— 60,000 crore allocated for providing access to tap water to 3.8 crore households
— In 2022-23, 80 lakh households will be identified for the affordable housing scheme
— A high-level committee for urban planners and economists to be formed for recommendations on urban capacity building, planning implementation, and governance.
— 5 existing academic institutions for urban planning to be designated as Centre for Excellence with endowment fund of Rs 250 cr
— Modern building by-laws will be introduced
— A high-level panel to be set up for urban planning
— Govt to promote use of public transport in urban areas
MSMEs & startups
— Rs 6,000 crore programme to rate MSMEs to be rolled out over 5 years
— MSMEs such as Udyam, e-shram, NCS & Aseem portals will be inter-linked, their scope will be widened
— They will now perform as portals with live organic databases providing G-C, B-C & B-B services such as credit facilitation, enhancing entrepreneurial opportunities
— A fund with blended capital raised under co-investment model facilitated through NABARD to finance startups in agriculture & rural enterprises for farm produce value chain
— Startups will promoted for Drone Shakti
— PE/VC invested Rs 5.5 lakh crore in startup, expert committee will be set up to suggest measures to help attract investment
Agri
— Govt to pay Rs 2.37 lakh crore towards procurement of wheat and paddy under MSP operations
— 2022-23 has been announced as International Year of Millets
— Railways will develop new products for small farmers and MSMEs
— A rationalised scheme to increase domestic oilseed production will be brought in to cut down imports
— Kisan Drones for crop assessment, land records, spraying of insecticides expected to drive a wave of technology in agri sector
— Ken Betwa river linking project worth Rs 44,605 crore announced
— Draft DPRs for 5 river links have been finalised
— Finance startups to be incentives to aid rural enterprises
— Natural farming will be promoted along Ganga river corridor
— A completely paperless, e-bill system will be launched by ministries for procurement
— Financial support will be provided to farmers to take up agro-forestry
Electric Vehicles
— Battery swapping policy to allow EV charging stations for automobiles will be framed
— Private sector will be encouraged to create sustainable and innovative business models for battery and energy as a service, improving the efficiency in the EV ecosystem
Education
— States to be encouraged to revise syllabi of agricultural universities to meet needs of natural, zero-budget & organic farming, modern-day agriculture
— One class, one TV channel' program of PM eVIDYA will be expanded from 12 to 200 TV channels
— This will enable all states to provide supplementary education in regional languages for classes 1 to 12
— Digital university to be set up to provide education; to be built on hub and spoke model
— 1-Class-1-TV Channel to be implemented to provide supplementary education to children to make up for loss of formal education due to Covid
Finance & inclusion
— Rs 1 lakh crore financial assistance to states to be provided in 2022-23 to catalyse investments
— Proposed to introduce Digital Rupee by RBI using blockchain technology, starting 2022-23
— Measures will be taken to step up private capital in infra sector
— Digital Rupee to be rolled out by 2023
— 100% of 1.5 lakh post offices will come on the core banking system, enabling financial inclusion and access to accounts through net banking, mobile banking, ATMs, and also provide online transfer of funds between post office accounts and bank accounts
— This will be helpful especially for farmers and senior citizens in rural areas, enabling inter operability, and financial inclusion.
— IBC amendments to enhance efficiency of resolution process
— Facilitate cross-border insolvency resolution
— To speed up voluntary winding up of companies
— 75 digital banks in 75 districts will be set up by scheduled commercial banks to encourage digital payments
— International arbitration centre will be set up in GIFT city to provide faster dispute resolution
— World-class university to be allowed in GIFT IFSC free from domestic regulation, says FM
Healthcare
— An open platform for the national digital health ecosystem will be rolled out
— It will consist of digital registries of health providers and health facilities, unique health identity and universal access to health facilities
— 95 per cent of 112 aspirational districts have made significant progress in health, infra
— For mental health counselling, a National Tele Mental Health Program will be launched
Telecom
— Spectrum auction will be conducted in 2022 for the rollout of 5G
— Scheme for design led manufacturing to be launched for 5G ecosystem as part of PLI scheme to enable affordable broadband and mobile communication in rural and remote areas
— 5 pc of USO Fund to be provided for R&D and technology upgradation
— Contracts for laying optical fibre in villages to be awarded under BharatNet project under PPP in 2022-23
— Data centre and energy storage system to be given infrastructure status; move to provide easy financing
Women & Children
— Recognising the importance of 'Nari Shakti', 3 schemes were launched to provide integrated development for women and children
— 2 lakh Anganwadis to be upgraded for improving child health
Ease of Business
— 75,000 compliances have been eliminated and 1,486 union laws repealed to make it easier for businesses
— Next phase of ease of doing business, ease of living to be launched
— Voluntary exit for corporates to be cut down to 6 months from 2 years
Defence
— Govt committed to reduce import and promote self reliance in defense sector
— 68 per cent of capital for defence sector to be earmarked for local industry
— Defense R&D will be opened up for industry, startups and academia with 25% of defense R&D budget.
— Private industry will be encouraged to take up the design and development of military platforms and equipment in collaboration with DRDO and other organizations through SPV model.
— 68% of capital procurement budget in defence will be earmarked for domestic industry in 2022-23 (up from the 58% last fiscal)
Railways
— 400 new generation Vande Bharat trains to be manufactured in next 3 years
— 2,000 km of rail network to be brought under indigenous technology KAWACH for safety and capacity augmentation: FM
Climate & Net Zero
— Risks of climate change are strongest externalities for the world
— Funds will be used for projects that will help reduce carbon intensity of the economy
— Sovereign green bonds will be part of government’s borrowing programme in FY23
— Proceeds to be deployed in public sector projects
— 4 pilot projects for coal gasification to be set up
— Rs 19,500 cr additional allocation for PLI for manufacturing high efficiency solar modules has been made
— Low carbon development strategy opens up employment opportunity
Travel
— ePassports will be rolled out in 2022-23 for convenience in overseas travel
— E-passport with embedded chip will be rolled out
vimal wrote:OT maybe but NYT and Bloomberg both have extremely negative headlines for budget. The Bloomberg guy called Andy Mukherjee seems to be on a 24x7 crusade against Modi/India.
Good accounting brings good friends in tough times. So Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman channelled a bit of the Dunkirk spirit into Budget 2023 presented Tuesday.
It's the government's tenth budget and was so freighted with expectations that Sitharaman would stir our stumps with an energetic mission, if not money. On cue, the FM did lay out a 25-year blueprint with a grandiose India@100 vision, indicating the government's long-term outlook.
The budget speech -- her shortest so far -- ticked the right boxes of job creation, infrastructure push, a proposed digital rupee, taxing cryptocurrencies, and public expenditure prioriotising growth over the needless obsession with debt.
That said, Budget 2023 isn't without annoying pockmarks, largely due to under-focused aspects like the lack of measures addressing a demand push or doubling of farmers income that needs an urgent second wind. As for individuals and the middleclass, they only got FM's half a heart. Households continue to swing between despair and hope, and need only two things: low taxes and low inflation. But they got neither, though the FM hinted that like good things, bad things will come to an end, if you wait a little longer.
The key watchword for this Budget is growth, driven by capex, digital expansion, Make in India (Atmanirbhar Bharat), and credible and conservative financial projections.
In short, the Budget is as “boring” as it should be by focusing on basics. And that is its greatest strength.
vimal wrote:OT maybe but NYT and Bloomberg both have extremely negative headlines for budget. The Bloomberg guy called Andy Mukherjee seems to be on a 24x7 crusade against Modi/India.
No worries. Andy & Suraj are fast friends.
They are upset because each year it becomes harder and harder to talk about indians as powerless dirty bhooka nanga sdres. How will they sell their papers without atrocity and sadness? Additional mirchi is provided by the fact that the proud and evil sdre modi is doing this
chaitanya wrote:How will they sell their papers without atrocity and sadness? Additional mirchi is provided by the fact that the proud and evil sdre modi is doing this
New Woke Times has a similar approach. Add to the mix that the current "economic woes" and upside-down Gini-indices are due to thousands of years of upper caste hegemony and you have future Pulitzer prize-winning 25-year old English/Philosophy majors.
vimal wrote:OT maybe but NYT and Bloomberg both have extremely negative headlines for budget. The Bloomberg guy called Andy Mukherjee seems to be on a 24x7 crusade against Modi/India.
No worries. Andy & Suraj are fast friends.
If people don't know the joke, it's that Andy blocked me on Twitter before I'd ever visited his profile there, and of course I've never interacted with him ever.
New Woke Times is a keeper Anupmisraji, what is really pathetic is their headline itself is so moronic "India spends on roads and infra instead of job creation" as if the roads and trains are magically conjured without any labor or the material inputs that are not manufactured but created. How does such asinine reporting get popular is a mystery I am yet to solve.
I feel most of the current rona dhona from usual quarters (BBC, NYT WaPo) is because Xiden admin hasn't been able to push their own China spend bill but see India pushing ahead with NaMo's $1T infrastructure jobs creation agenda.
Suraj wrote:Lets stick to thread topic. Others can cry in their own homes.
Agree. There is enough data now to show how India is coming out of the pandemic with some strength. The only pit falls are potential oil price increase and a US-Russia war that impacts trade & travel.
Sir,
permit me to share this with my friends with due credit to you.
Regards
Jaysimha
I second that. It was a crisp and succinct summary. Great job by vijayk. I too would like to share it with a bunch of journalism students that I teach. Hope vijayk would permit.
What was notable for me from NS' budget speech and the summary is that India is moving away from the long held tradition of "announcing sops" to this section or that group in the budget. There is a clear psychological shift - moving away from handing out candies for appeasement or accommodation of pressure groups to doing what is needed based on the current situation and future vision. Its a confident do "good budget", that doesn't care to "look good".
I think most of the press is disturbed by this but they haven't realised why... They just want easy sensational headline material and cant be bothered to really analyse and understand this budget and its impact.
Opposition parties are worse. They clamour about lack of announcements of (sarkari) job creation instead of realising the govt wants to enable entrepreneurship, MSMEs which will in turn create jobs. They raise Ambani Adani bogey without realising common mango Mahesh wants freedom to create his own destiny.
RRajan and Andy M types haven't got it either, they refuse to believe this "desi woman" of an FM under a "hindu nationalist" PM is hitting it out of the park without the "learned advice" of Nobel laureates and Harvard-returned economists, while G8 countries are struggling.
Good news before budget: Exports are at record high.
Big reasons are shift out of China & smart policies by Centre, states
January 30, 2022, 8:09 PM IST Neelkanth Mishra https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/blo ... re-states/
A large handset component manufacture is only weeks away from starting commercial production at a plant where ground breaking occurred less than 15 months back.
India's merchandise export in January 2022 increased by 23.69 per cent to $34.06 billion over $27.54 billion in the same month last year, registering an increase of 31.75 per cent over $25.85 billion in January 2020.
The merchandise export in April-January 2021-22 rose by 46.53 per cent to $335.44 billion over $228.9 billion in the same period last fiscal and marking an increase of 27 per cent over $264.13 billion in 2019-20 (April-January).
Meanwhile, India’s merchandise import in January 2022 was $52.01 billion, an increase of 23.74 per cent over $42.03 billion in January 2021 and an increase of 26.38 per cent over $ 41.15 billion in January 2020, the Commerce Ministry said in a release on Tuesday (1 February).
The merchandise import in April-January 2021-22 was $495.83 billion, an increase of 62.68 per cent over $304.79 billion in 2020-21 (April-January) and an increase of 22.3 per cent over $405.33 billion in 2019-20 (April-January).
The trade deficit in January 2022 was $17.94 billion, while it was $160.38 billion during 2021-22 (April-January).
According to the latest data by the Ministry of Industry and Commerce, India exported electronic goods worth Rs 83,000 crore ($11 billion) in the first three quarters of 2021-22. Remarkably, it is a 49 per cent increase over previous year exports of first nine months. In 2019, India’s export figures for the first 9-month were worth only Rs 56,000 crores.
Experts are hoping that these early trends will help in India’s target of achieving electronic export figures over $15 billion. Moreover, optimists of the bunch also believe that burgeoning electronic exports will help India achieve a total export target of $120 billion by 2026.
Moreover, at a time when the foreign exchange reserves of countries like Brazil, South Africa, Turkey, and Pakistan are depleting, India amassed a record amount of forex in the last few years. In the ongoing fiscal year, India’s foreign exchange reserves have been above the foreign debt the country had throughout that year. This means India can service all of its debt in one go without impacting its macroeconomic stability.
The current level of foreign exchange reserves is enough to cover more than one year of imports. The foreign exchange reserves of the country are around 634 billion dollars while the foreign debt is around 600 billion dollars
Patna To Guwahati, Via Bengal And Bangladesh: How Modi Sarkar Intends To Unlock NE India’s Potential By Developing Waterways
Saturday (5 February) saw Waterways Minister Sarbananda Sonowal flagging off a cargo ship carrying foodgrains from Patna that will make its way through Bengal and Bangladesh to reach Guwahati’s Pandu port.
As part of its policy to develop waterways for cheaper and ‘greener’ movement of cargo and passengers, the Modi government has been focusing on using rivers to unlock development opportunities for the landlocked Northeast region of the country.
The flagging off ceremony marked the formal inauguration of the vital link between national waterway-1 (from Prayagraj in Uttar Pradesh to Haldia in Bengal) and national waterway-2 (from Dibrugarh to Dhubri in Assam) through Bangladesh’s rivers.
The cargo vessel--MV Lal Bahadur Shastri--will sail down the Ganga and Hooghly to reach Haldia and then skirt the sea coast of Bengal and Bangladesh to travel upstream through the Indo-Bangladesh Protocol Route-1 through Bangladesh’s Khulna, Narayanganj, Sirajganj and Chilmari to enter Assam through Dhubri and sail upstream through the Brahmaputra to reach Pandu.
The ship will take an estimated 25 days to travel this distance (between Patna and Pandu) of 2,350 kilometers. Transporting cargo from Bihar to Assam through this waterway route will cost about 25 per cent less than the overland road route. Apart from being cheaper, waterways also present a ‘greener’ option since river vessels are much less polluting than trucks.
To facilitate more freight movement through national waterways-1 from Bihar, the Union government is constructing an intermodal terminal at Kalughat in Saran, about 40 kilometers west of Patna. This Rs 79 crore project will be completed by the end of next year. Kalughat is on the banks of the Ganga and is connected to National Highway 19 which is a short distance away. This intermodal terminal will benefit traders, exporters and importers from eastern Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Nepal.
Sonowal said that India is helping Bangladesh maintain the two IBP routes. India will bear 80 per cent of the nearly Rs 306 crore that is being spent to facilitate easy navigation through these two routes by dredging the rivers. Bangladesh will bear 20 per cent of the cost. As per an agreement between India and Bangladesh, the contract for dredging these two routes has been awarded till 2026 and after that, a fresh contract will be awarded.
This will be a huge booster for the NE region economy. Tripura was already connected to the Chittagong port which is just a bit more travel along the coast from the Meghna estuary. A long awaited dream coming true.
These routes could really help in creating lots of MSME's in Tripura, Mizoram, Manipur and Barak valley. These lands have a lot of potential.
I am not sure but if a good road connection can be made from Tura down to the Brahmaputra, then even Garo hills will get connected..... (I think now I am just happily day dreaming!)
India’s exports grew by 28.51 per cent to USD 8.67 billion during February 1-7 on account of healthy growth in sectors such as petroleum, engineering and gems and jewellery, according to the preliminary data of the commerce ministry.
The exports during the first week of this month rose by about 31 per cent.
According to the data, USD 8.67 billion per week is almost 20 per cent more than the weekly run rate of USD 7 billion clocked this year.
The country’s exports rose by 23.69 per cent to USD 34.06 billion in January.
Cumulatively, exports during April-January 2021-22 rose by 46.53 per cent to USD 335.44 billion as against USD 228.9 billion in the same period last year.
nishant.gupta wrote:
I am not sure but if a good road connection can be made from Tura down to the Brahmaputra, then even Garo hills will get connected..... (I think now I am just happily day dreaming!)
Tura already has a road that connects it to the Brahmaputra. The shortest route would be to Mankachar. You can take a vehicle from Tura to Mankachar in Assam via Garobadha. The distance is 28 km from Tura to Garobadha and another 21 km from Garobadha to Mankachar. You can cross the Brahmaputra from Mankachar to Dhubri using rickety boats seating around 30-40 people (never saw any large boats of the types seen in Guwahati). I used to cross it a few times when I lived in Siliguri (around 2000-01). The road from Tura to Mankachar needs to be widened but overall the condition was good for the volume of traffic in those times.
nishant.gupta wrote:
I am not sure but if a good road connection can be made from Tura down to the Brahmaputra, then even Garo hills will get connected..... (I think now I am just happily day dreaming!)
Tura already has a road that connects it to the Brahmaputra. The shortest route would be to Mankachar. You can take a vehicle from Tura to Mankachar in Assam via Garobadha. The distance is 28 km from Tura to Garobadha and another 21 km from Garobadha to Mankachar. You can cross the Brahmaputra from Mankachar to Dhubri using rickety boats seating around 30-40 people (never saw any large boats of the types seen in Guwahati). I used to cross it a few times when I lived in Siliguri (around 2000-01). The road from Tura to Mankachar needs to be widened but overall the condition was good for the volume of traffic in those times.
Yes I have used the road once in 2006-07 but it was not good for big transport like trucks. If we can get container boats to Guwahati, they are obviously crossing Mankachar. Build a small dock in this area (in India and not Bangladesh)... I am not sure about the road conditions now though I know a lot of work has happened on the Guwahati - Shillong road.
