INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
Union Minister of Commerce and Industry Piyush Goyal | (Photo: PTI)3 min read Last Updated : Oct 16 2024 | 11:26 AM IST
Commerce and
Industry Minister Piyush Goyal on Wednesday asked the industry to focus on making high quality products to tap global markets as export
competitiveness will not come from government subsidies or support.
He also said that the government is putting its effort to nudge
industry to get into the manufacturing of high quality products as it is a "tough" task to get industry to accept that they should be making
quality goods.Click here to connect with us on WhatsApp
Initially, the government faced a huge amount of opposition from the industry on
quality control orders.
"Our export competitiveness is not going to come from subsidies or government support
It is not going to come from our closing the doors to the rest of the world
If we are looking at self-reliant India, it can only happen when India will be self-confident and that confidence will only come when we all
product, that can be imported the industry has to work towards competitiveness where it has a comparative advantage with other
nations.
The government is taking a series of steps such as rolling out Quality Control Orders (QCOs) to boost manufacturing in the
country.
Till 2014, he said, only 14 QCOs covering 106 products were issued, but in the last 10 years, the government has issued as many
as 174 such orders covering 732 products to ensure that more and more people will become aligned with better quality standards.
These
orders help curb the import of sub-standard products, prevent unfair trade practices and ensure the safety and well-being of consumers as
well as the environment.
Under the order, an item cannot be produced, sold, traded, imported and stocked unless it bears the Bureau of
Indian Standards (BIS) mark.
Violation of the provision of the BIS Act can attract imprisonment of up to two years or a fine of at least
Rs 2 lakh for the first offence
In case of second and subsequent offences, the fine will increase to a minimum of Rs 5 lakh and extend up to 10 times of the value of goods
or articles.
QCOs are issued in accordance with the WTO Agreement on Technical Barriers to Trade.
He also said that manufacturing high
quality goods helps boost economic activities, generating jobs and increasing exports.
"India will have to aspire to become a manufacturer
of high quality goods and services and it should be recognised globally," Goyal said.
Citing an example of the pharma industry, the
minister also urged the big industry players to handhold and support MSME units in this area.
"We still have a lot of work to do in terms
of getting industry aligned with these QCOs," he said adding India was not able to become a partner of a protocol in the pharma sector as
"every single time when we try to join that protocol, which has certain strict conditionalities attached to it, there will be an opposition
from those (industries) who would be looking at short cuts".
The minister urged the industry to participate in the BIS (Bureau of Indian
Standards) committees through their skilled technical manpower.(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the
Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)First Published: Oct 16 2024 | 11:26 AMIST
