(Views expressed in this article are the personal opinion of the author.)
The garment exports have not been performing well. This would stand corroborated by the fact there has been near stagnation in garment exports, which was of the order of $10.11 billion in 2008-09, $11.00 billion in 2009-10, and $11.01billion in 2010-11. However, during 2011-12, the exports went up to $13.69billion. Though there has been an acknowledged decline in exports during the current fiscal, the Government, in its wisdom, first fixed a target of $14billion and then raised it to $ 17.00 billion, which was further hiked to $18billion, which has been dubbed as "difficult" to "extremely difficult" and unlikely to be achieved by various trade bodies. Export in dollar terms for first six months of the FY 2012-13 has declined by 10.21 per cent over the same period of previous FY and reached to USD 6226 million.
However, in rupee terms exports increased by 8.49 per cent compared to same period of last FY. In April-September 2012-13 in rupee terms apparel export of India was to the tune of Rs. 34034 crore compared to Rs. 31372 crore in April-September2011-12. In the FY 2011-12 exports in dollar terms increased by 17.9 per cent from previous FY and total led USD 13699 million in April-March 2011-12.
This article was originally published in the Stitch Times magazine, February, 2013.
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