Jairam shares leather industry's view on appreciating dollar

Chennai, May 29 (UNI) Union Minister of State for Commerce Jairam Ramesh today shared the concern of the Leather Industry on the appreciating value of the Indian rupee against the US Dollar putting domestic leather exports in a disadvantageous position vis-a-vis China.

Talking to reporters after a review meeting with the Council for Leather Exports (CLE) here, he said the issue was raised at the meeting by the CLE.

''I listened to them. My department cannot do much on it. I will apprise Union Finance Minister P Chidambaram about the concerns expressed by the industry.'' Mr Ramesh said he would also try to arrange a presentation by the CLE with the Finance Ministry to sort out the difficulties.

Stating that in a sector like leather there was price competition, Mr Ramesh said transaction cost on exports should be reduced so that 'we do not lose markets in Vietnam and China.' He was it was time for Indian leather industry to increase its penetration in the US and European markets following imposition of ten per cent anti-dumping duty on Vietnam and 16 per cent on China by Europe for a period of two years from August 2006.

He also urged the industry to improve the share of exports in women and children footwear, which was in great demand in the US. At present 90 per cent of exports were men's footwear, he added.

The Minister said leather exports from India had touched the three billion USD mark in 2006-07 and it was well on course of attaining the seven billion USD mark by 2010-11 as per the vision document of the CLE.

The exports in 2006-07 stood at 3.1 billion USD, a growth of 15 per cent when compared to 2.7 billion USD in 2005-06.

Though this was marginally short of the target of 3.4 Billion USD set under the vision document, the Industry was moving in the right direction to attain the targetted seven billion USD in 2010-11.

About 38 per cent of the 3.1 billion USD export was from leather footwear and footwear components and the aim was to increase it's share to 56 per cent by 2010-11, besides creating half a million new jobs in five years to have a total employment of 2.2 million in 2011.

UNI