The government is likely to release the new Foreign Trade Policy (FTP) by the end of this month with a vision of increasing exports of goods and services worth $2 trillion by 2030, Commerce Secretary Sunil Barthwal has said.

The current FTP, which was extended six months back till March 31, 2023, is unlikely to get another extension as the new FTP will replace it.

“During this six-month period, we have been developing a new FTP. We have looked at various aspects of the FTP because the policy is a collection of the various incentive schemes we have,” Barthwal said at a press briefing on Wednesday.

The government is adding the aspect of vision into the FTP as it is targeting to take the goods and services exports to $2 trillion by 2030. “We can envision $1 trillion of exports in goods and $1 trillion in services. So, total exports of $2 trillion. Within that framework, we have worked out an FTP and we are expecting that it would be released by the end of this month,” he said.

The new FTP was initially scheduled to be announced in 2020 but it was postponed several times, mainly to tide over the uncertainties unleashed by the Covid-19 pandemic.

Eyeing supportive FTP

The Indian industry is looking forward to a supportive FTP as it is being announced at a time when exporters are going through a difficult period due to a slowdown in global demand. High global inflation, rising interest rates, and key economies moving towards recession have all contributed to making the future uncertain.

Last fiscal India’s goods exports touched a record high of $422 billion growing at over 40 per cent year-on-year, but current global uncertainties dampened performance in the on-going fiscal. While goods exports this fiscal are set to surpass last year’s figures, the growth rate is unlikely to be as impressive. Per latest data issued by the government, goods exports increased by 7.55 per cent to $405.94 billion in April-February 2023.

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