NEW DELHI: India's shipments increased by over 9% in December, marking a positive growth for the second month in a row. Simultaneously, imports too turned positive, with a growth in excess of 27% in the same month, ending an 11-month negative spell to signal a robust demand from the domestic manufacturing sector.
The value of exports in December grew to $14.6 billion from $13.36 billion a year ago. Imports during the same period increased to $24.75 billion from $19.45 billion year-on-year.
Since October 2008, exports turned positive for the first time in November with over 18% growth to end 13 straight months of downslide as demand from global markets dried up in the wake of economic slowdown.
Federation of Indian Export Organisations president A Sakthivel saw the positive growth continuing in the next three months also as most of the economies recover and Indian exporters diversify their markets. He said $170 billion worth of exports this year should be considered satisfying, given the dismal performance of some of the export-led economies.
Last year, Indian shipments were valued at $185 billion. For the April-December period this fiscal, exports dropped by 20.3% to $117.58 billion from $147.56 billion. But for Sakthivel, the growth in imports is a reflection of the double-digit growth in the manufacturing sector.
Meanwhile, the country's oil imports also went up nearly 43%, a growth for the second month in a row, to $6.53 billion in December compared to $4.57 billion a year ago. Oil imports during the first nine months of this fiscal was $56.91 billion against $81.10 billion in the April-December period of 2008-09.
Source : TOI