The Union Finance Minister, Mr Pranab Mukherjee, said here on Thursday that the country's exports were on the road to recovery after a gap of nearly 13 months.
“The export bill for November will be better,” he said while addressing the annual general meeting of the Kolkata-based Bharat Chamber of Commerce.
Elaborating the need for broad-basing the export destinations, he said 65 per cent of Indian exports went to the US, Europe, North America, Canada and Japan.
“As these countries are most affected by the economic downturn, our exports did not pick up during the last 13 months,” he said adding that the recovery of the US and a few others economies have finally “started leaving positive impact on the country's export bill”.
The Finance Minister, however, cautioned that the difficult days are far from over as Europe was still reeling under low gross domestic product (GDP) growth of 1-1.5 per cent.
“We had a difficult year and the difficulty is not yet over. However, I am optimistic that the country will post a growth of 7.75 per cent in this fiscal and has enough resilience to take on the challenges namely bringing down the fiscal deficit from the existing 6.5 per cent and protecting the interests of the poor by offering food and essentials at a subsidised price,” he said.
Earlier, Mr Mukherjee also addressed the inaugural programme of the 23 {+r} {+d} Industrial India Trade Fair, organised jointly by the West Bengal Government and the Bengal National Chamber of Commerce and Industry.
Food price rise
Expressing “deep concern” over the rise in food prices, Mr Mukherjee felt that the supply constraints vis-à-vis rising demand for food by the ever growing population was the prime reason behind it.
According to him, during the last five years the procurement price of wheat increased by Rs 450 a quintal and of paddy by Rs 400 a quintal. There was an increase in the price of sugarcane to Rs 225 a quintal and a 5-6 million tonne supply shortfall in pulses.
“While we had to increase the procurement price of food grains to ensure higher production of the same, the higher price of pulses in the global market led to lack of imports,” he said.
Mr. Mukherjee focussed on the 2,60,000 public distribution system outlets in the country to ensure supplies of essential items at subsidised prices to the less privileged.
“There should be a mechanism to prevent hoarding so that if anyone found hoarding should immediately be booked,” he said.
Source : Business Line