JAIPUR: The textile sector battling competition and sharp increase in raw material costs has got a breather.
The finance minister in her Budget speech said for incentivising exports, exemptions are being provided on items such as embellishment, trimming, fasteners, buttons, zipper, lining material, specified leather, furniture fittings and packaging boxes that may be needed by exporters of handicrafts, textiles and leather garments, leather footwear and other goods.
Vimal Shah, president of Garment Exporters Association of Rajasthan, said duty reduction would bring in some relief but at the same time, it will save lot of time.
“Because of the duty, these accessory items used to be held up at the customs department. Now, they expect swifter customs clearance. It will save lot of time for the manufacturers. Of course, duty cut will result in lower input costs and will benefit the industry,” said Shah.
But the handicrafts industry was not overly enthused. Dileep Baid, former chairman of Federation of Rajasthan Handicraft Exporters, said the embellishments form a very small part of their raw material import.
“As such we are getting 5% duty refund. That’s why the benefit is miniscule and will not have any material impact,” said Baid.
Shah said the major difficulty the garment exporters are facing is rise in yarn and fabric prices. “The cost of fabric has gone up by 40% in the past one year because of costlier yarn prices. While the finance minister did not address the issue in the Budget, we hope they take it up in the export-import policy that is scheduled to be announced later,,” added Shah.
