Industry Consultation on Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership held at Ludhiana

Ludhiana, August 29, 2014: Federation of Indian Export Organisations (FIEO), Punjab Chapter in association with Ministry of Commerce & Industry, Govt of India & Centre for WTO Studies organised an Industry Consultation on Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) on Friday at Ludhiana.
Bipin Menon, Director and Vijay Kumar, Director from Ministry of Commerce & Industry, Govt of India, New Delhi were present to take the feedback from the exporters especially from engineering, machine tools & textile sectors.
S C Ralhon, Regional Chairman (North), FIEO while in his welcome address apprised the participant entrepreneurs about the importance of this meet and the view points of the respective representatives who came from different trade & industry associations. Ralhan said Ministry of Commerce & Industry, Govt of India, WTO, DGFT & FIEO have collectively made efforts on the whole to take feedback from the exporters from engineering & textile sectors across the country.
Ralhan said the objective of this RCEP agreement between 16 ASEAN countries is to promote the exports from the country. He also emphasised that import is equally important and in several phases of exports right from the beginning the raw material like steel, copper & brass import is very important. Under pre FTA consultation industry view points are very much necessary to inculcate so that we can exactly reach at the things which effects our competitiveness of exports. Sh Ralhan shared with the exporters some of the statistical figures of foreign trade in India of yesteryears. He said import in some specific sectors has outperformed the exports figure which isn’t a healthy sign so the need of the hour is to increase our exports relevantly.
M S Dhillon, Regional Joint DGFT, Ludhiana in his remarks apprised the participant exporters that such seminars aims at seeking feedback that lately results in the concessions from Ministry of Commerce & Industry, Govt of India linked to the particular product code (HS / ITC code). He urged to all the exporters to please give their genuine feedback to the officials from Ministry of Commerce & Industry to arrive at an FTA which is more effective & exports friendly.
The Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) is intended to be a free trade agreement(FTA) between the 10 countries of ASEAN namely Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam and the six countries with which ASEAN has existing Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) – Australia, China, India, Japan, Korea, and New Zealand.
Bipin Menon, Director, Ministry of Commerce & Industry, Govt of India gave a statistical presentation on how Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) takes place and what are its benefits. He apprised the participants that in fact there are three types of FTA namely Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) on the Western Flank, Trans Atlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) on the Central Flank and RCEP fits the bill of Eastern Flank. And RCEP is comparatively the smallest one.
Vijay Kumar, Director, Ministry of Commerce & Industry, Govt of India through a suitable presentation apprised the exporters the Rules of Origin (ROO) and detailed on the benefits of the origination of the goods so that their goods can be accorded the benefits accrued under FTP/CECA and under this ongoing RCEP which is likely to conclude by the end of year 2015.
Ashwani Kumar, Member FIEO Management committee expressed vote of thanks and highlighted certain vital things which needs to be taken care of in the present scenario of international trade and such seminar on industry consultation should be organised in future too for the benefits of the exporting community.
A large number of exporters especially from engineering & textile sector & different trades & industry associations like Shawls Club, Knitwear Club, Wool Club, Textile Associations of Punjab, Auto Parts Manufacturers Associations, Cycle Parts Manufacturers Associations, Ludhiana Hand Tools Mfrs Associations, Oil Mill Mfrs Associations, Fasteners Mfrs Association, Consortium of Machine Mfrs Associations participated and commended FIEO’s efforts to organise such a vital, industry favoured & export oriented seminar. They thanked S C Ralhan, Regional Chairman (North), FIEO and urged him to come up with more such seminars on industry consultations with regard to uplifting the exports of the country.