Chennai: Union Minister of Commerce and Industry, Consumer Affairs, Food, Public Distribution and Textiles Piyush Goyal has said India’s achievement of record $400 billion of goods exports is a shining example of the way this country is being governed, reformed and transformed since 2014 with a mission to decisively improve the lives of citizens.
‘The surge in exports is helping farmers, artisans, weavers and factory workers, and helping businesses, small and large to create jobs, scale up operations, become more competitive and make a mark in the global business arena,’ he said in an article.
The export target of $400 billion seemed impossible to many in the Covid-ravaged world, where demand was weak, scarce containers were priced exorbitantly and the world was facing job losses and conflicts.
But this did not deter Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government from acting decisively and swiftly with a bottom-up approach in assessing the situation, identifying products and regions where exports could be increased, and adopting a partnership approach with exporters and industry bodies to deliver results, he said.
According to Goyal, it was indeed an ambitious mission because the best India had achieved in merchandise exports in the past was $330 billion in the pre-Covid days of 2018-19, after which the pandemic battered global trade.
But India bounced back rapidly as policy measures, reforms, export-promotion schemes, major initiatives like the Production Linked Incentive Scheme, and bold decisions in the face of adversity propelled India to become the fastest growing major economy in the world.