G-20 curbs may play spoiler with India’s export target

To achieve the export target of $ 500 billion by 2014, India may now have to grapple with the ongoing slowdown and the protectionist measures initiated by other G-20 countries.

Blaming G-20 countries of having initiated more protectionist measures of late, the World Trade Organization (WTO) in its recent report estimated that this had hampered world merchandise trade by about 3 per cent.

Another joint study by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) and Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) pointed out that trade within the G-20 itself had taken a hit of 3.8 per cent due to the measures.

Moreover, the report’s projection of a slowdown in global trade to 3.7 per cent in 2012 from 5 per cent in 2011 and 13.8 per cent in 2010 is below the long-term annual average of 5.4 per cent for the last 20 years.

With regard to exports, the report projects a 2 per cent rise for developed economies in the current year, and a 5.6 per cent upsurge for developing countries. This projection is significantly lower than the target of 20 per cent jump in exports set by India for 2012-13.

The report also highlighted that 124 new trade restrictive measures, including trade remedy actions, tariff increases, import licences and Customs controls, were put in place between mid-October 2011 and mid-May 2012, which resulted in hampering around 1.1 per cent of G-20 merchandise imports.

In contrast, new import curbs introduced between mid-May and mid-October 2011 hindered only 0.6 per cent of G-20 imports, the report said.

Source : Exim News Service - NEW DELHI, June 26