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India : Handicrafts Council urges Govt to make fund for export promotion |
2006-2-9
February 9, 2006 |
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Shri Sudhir Tyagi, who has been recently elected as Chairman of the Export Promotion council for Handicrafts has said that India has to make aggressive efforts for matching and improving upon its competitors by improving the quality, designs, packaging, presentation and marketing techniques so that India’s share in the world market can be increased substantially.
Shri Sudhir Tyagi said that the ECPH has submitted a memo to the Prime Minister of India for creating a corpus fund of Rs.1000 crores for special export promotion drive covering all aspects to increase share in the world market and creating additional employment opportunities.
Mr Tyagi expects that such a corpus fund will help in increasing export by about 3 fold in next 5 years time and India’s share may grow up to 4 percent in the world market.
The fund will also help in developing handicrafts from unexplored/under explored regions like Orissa, Jharkhand, Uttranchal, Chhattisgarh, J&K & North Eastern regions.
Increase in exports of handicrafts will generate employment at least 4 to 5 folds resulting in improvement in the livelihood of backward and economically weaker sections of India.
The handicrafts sector directly employs more than 60 lakh craftspersons and artisans belonging mainly to backward and economically weaker sections of India. Many more lakhs are indirectly employed by way of design, packaging, transport, publicity and exports etc.
Exports of handicrafts have been growing consistently at an annual rate of 20 percent over the past decade. Still the world market share of India is around 2% as against China’s share of 30 percent.
The world market is estimated to be of the order of US $ 235 billion. India’s main competitors are China, Taiwan, Korea, Indonesia, Thailand, Turkey and some Latin American countries. |
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Press Information Bureau Government of India | |
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