Goods exports in January clocked a lacklustre growth of 3.74 per cent (year on year) to $26.36 billion as exports of key items such as petroleum, engineering goods and leather slowed down.

Trade deficit widened marginally to $15.67 billion in January compared to $14.73 billion in January 2018 as imports during the month remained almost static at $41.1 billion, according to advance estimates released by the Commerce Department on Friday.

“Global trade growth is slowing down and global economies, including China and the South-East Asian nations, are facing contraction in manufacturing worsening the fragile global situation. Almost all the sectors during the month have shown nominal growth. However, petroleum was one sector that showed higher negative growth pulling down overall exports for the month by about 3 per cent,” said Ganesh Kumar Gupta, President, FIEO.

Total exports for the period April-January 2018-19 were at $271.80 billion, 9.52 per cent higher than exports in the comparable period last fiscal. Total imports in the same period was 11.27 per cent higher at $427.73 billion widening the trade deficit to $155.93 billion from $136.25 billion in the first 10 months of the previous fiscal.

The government hopes to export goods worth $330 billion in 2018-19, which will be the highest for India. Sectors which posted a healthy export growth in January include drugs and pharmaceuticals, ready-made garments, gems and jewellery and electronic goods. Petroleum products, which contribute significantly to India’s export basket, however, posted a dip of 19.2 per cent to $3.2 billion. Imports which posted a decline in January were from sectors including petroleum products, transport equipment and pearls, precious and semi-precious stones. Gold imports increased 38 per cent during the month to $2.31 billion.

FIEO reiterated its demand for support in the form of augmenting the flow of credit, granting higher tax deduction for R&D and extension of better fiscal support.

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