(MENAFN- KNN India)
Duty free access for Indian textiles under India-Australia FTA to expand exports
New Delhi, Dec 27 (KNN) With the elimination of duty, India’s exports of textiles and apparels to Australia are expected to gain from USD 0.5 billion to USD 1.1 billion in the next 3 years, said Parul Singh, Deputy Secretary in the Department of Commerce (DOC) on Tuesday.
Presenting on Indo- Australia ECTA which highlighted the benefits of the deal for the Apparel Industry, she said additional capacity creation due to exports and re-investment, is likely to create additional employment of 40,000 persons per annum.
This ECTA has a higher value addition of 35 per cent for specifying country of origin, which has been deliberately kept to avoid the leakages from other countries, said Singh at an outreach programme with apparel exporters was organized by the DOC in association with AEPC.
“We are now going to work for board-based CECA building upon the ECTA deal which will make it comprehensive,” she added.
This was the first outreach programme on Indo- Australia Economic Co-operation and Trade Agreement (ECTA) where government and exporters exchanged their views to harness the best potential of the ECTA deal.
The prominent members of garment trade including members from OGTC, GEMA, ATDC, etc. were present in the meeting.
Delivering the special address Sudhir Sekhri, Vice Chairman AEPC said,“Australia is the largest importer of garments in the Southern Hemisphere.
While China’s share of import of apparel into Australia is more than 70 per cent, India’s share in imports is less than 5 per cent. With the India-Australia ECTA getting operationalized, India will have a slight duty advantage over Vietnam and Indonesia for imports in the Australian market.”
Sekhri noted that as MOQ is small for Australia it will provide a big opportunity for even smaller and medium size exporters to supply Indian products.
Members suggested ways how the fabrics imports can be easily facilitated without going for an advance authorization scheme and suggested ways for faster clearances at the ports.
The other concerns and challenges raised by the exporters during the meeting included; smaller MOQs, availability of fabrics, simplification of procedures and timely facilitation at the ports, direct shipping lines with countries having FTA, design and fashion mapping, faster adjudication process, skill mapping, etc.
(KNN Bureau)
