Exports of engineering items in value terms stayed above US$ 9 billion in April and recorded 15% year-on-year growth. This clearly shows India is gradually moving towards becoming a manufacturing powerhouse in the world, EEPC India Chairman Mr. Mahesh Desai said.

“While the trade deals with UAE and Australia are expected to give a boost to the sector, the proposed free trade pacts with other countries like UK and Canada would further give impetus to exports from India,” he said.

“Even as several world institutions have downgraded India’s GDP growth it is still the fastest-growing among major economies. This suggests India stands on strong footing and the engineering sector which contributes over one-fourth of the country’s total exports would remain a key growth driver,” Mr Desai noted.

Mr. Desai said that there are certain challenges such as high logistics cost and unprecedented increase in raw material costs which have been hurting the engineering as well as other sectors.

“The government is well aware of the issues facing the sector and we hope policy actions would be taken to minimize the impact,” he said.