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Export growth for 2001-02 unlikely to be below 18%: Govt

The government does not share the view that the US economic slowdown is likely to severely hit India and expects export growth for the current fiscal not to fall below the target of 18 per cent set for 2000-01.

"We do not share at this moment a conclusion that export growth for 2001-02 will be lower than what was targetted for 2000-01," commerce secretary Prabir Sengupta told reporters on the sidelines of a seminar on Latin America organised by FIEO.

Sengupta said that the ministry was holding discussions with export organisations to finalise the target for the financial year 2001-02 and the same was likely to be firmed up within the next few weeks.

Earlier, speaking at the seminar he said that though there were apprehensions about India getting affected by the US slowdown and its spillover effect on economies of Europe and Japan, government did not at the moment share these views.

Sengupta pointed out that India had in 2000-01 attained an export growth of 20 per cent and throughout the last decade Indian exports has grown faster than the world exports.

"In fact the share of India's trade has gone up from 0.5-0.6 per cent in the last decade to 0.75-0.8 per cent at present," he said.

Sengupta said that since the market share of India's trade was so small in the global context, it could target higher growth and penetrate more market as compared to some other countries like Mexico which had grown fast but were now likely to be severely hit by the US economy slowdown.

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