India is poised to become the hub of Engineering Process Outsourcing (EPO) with the size of the Indian EPO market expected to touch US $ 30 billion annually by year 2015, from the current size of a little over US $ 3 billion. The estimated demand for engineering process outsourcing to India has grown at 30% to 35% from 2004-06. The global EPO market is poised to grow to US $ 110 to 140 billion by 2015. This is indicated in the Strategy Paper on “Growth of Engineering Process Outsourcing from India” which was released by Mr. Kamal Nath, Union Minister of Commerce & Industry, at the All India Awards presentation function of the Engineering Export Promotion Council (EEPC) here today.

The Minister congratulated EEPC for bringing out a strategy paper on EPO indicating the potential that exists in this emerging sector and assured that the recommendations of the strategy paper would be carefully looked into by his Ministry so that the EEPC could play a proactive role in promoting the EPO sector, besides export of engineering goods.

Mr. Rakesh Shah, Chairman, EEPC informed that engineering exports from India had touched the US $ 26 billion mark in 2006-07 and attributed this achievement to the outstanding performance of engineering exporters. He also flagged several issues of concerns to engineering exports.

Responding to some of the issues raised by Mr. Shah in his speech, Mr. Kamal Nath mentioned that the Duty Entitlement Pass Book (DEPB) had been extended till March 2008 and his Ministry was working to develop an alternative Duty Neutralisation Scheme that would replace the DEPB Scheme, which would lapse next year. He further pointed out that the Annual Supplement 2007 to the Foreign Trade Policy had addressed the issue of Service Tax component that gets factored into exports price.

He urged the engineering exporters to use the Focus Market Scheme to their utmost advantage in promoting exports of Indian engineering products to these markets, as the potential growth for India’s engineering exports in focus markets especially the CIS was huge. In this context, he mentioned that government had given export thrust to newer markets by expanding the list of Focus Market Scheme to include 16 new countries including the CIS and stressed that it was important to concentrate on developing markets in these countries.

While congratulating the engineering exporters (for the year 2005-06), Mr. Kamal Nath assured that all issues raised by Chairman Mr. Rakesh Shah would be looked into and his Ministry would extend all possible help to resolve them.

“In the last three years, our Government has consciously endeavored to carry out policies designed to make our products globally competitive. Indian exports, including, engineering exports are likely to face increased non-tariff barriers, considering that average tariffs for industrial products in all countries is headed southwards. This process has already begun for engineering products and is likely to gain greater momentum as India’s share in world exports increases in the coming years. Thus, the Doha Round of Trade Negotiations under the auspices of the WTO is a good opportunity for India and other developing countries to leverage such issues”, the Minister said.

* * * * *

 

 

 

 

Back