The Government has taken the following steps to boost the export of textiles, including cotton commodities:

·                     Announcement of a special Textile Package for garments and made-ups sector

·                     MEIS Scheme under new Foreign Trade Policy 2015-20

·                     Restoring Interest rate subvention for pre and post shipment credit for the textile sector

·                     Increased Duty Drawback rates for some textile articles

·                     Market Access Initiative (MAI) Scheme

·                     Market Development Assistance (MDA) Scheme

·                     Duty-free import of trimmings, embellishments and other specified item under Export Performance Certificate Entitlement Scheme

Apart from this, the Government has taken following initiatives specifically for cotton sector:

Export Policy of Cotton

The Export of Cotton at present is under Open General License. The Directorate General of Foreign Trade, Ministry of Commerce and Industry being the facilitator for the Import and Export of Cotton has dispensed with the registration requirement for Export of Cotton.

Export Policy of Cotton Yarn

The present policy for export of cotton yarn is “Free” i.e. export of cotton yarn has been permitted under Open General License. Further, the Directorate General of Foreign Trade, Ministry of Commerce and Industry has dispensed with the registration requirement for export of cotton yarn.

The above information was given by the Minister of State, Textiles, Shri Ajay Tamta today, in a written reply to a Rajya Sabha question.

***

GG/DJM