Union Government unveils National Capital Goods Policy 2016

The Union Government has unveiled a National Capital Goods Policy 2016 to give an impetus to the capital goods sector and the Make in India initiative.
It was unveiled by Union Minister of Heavy Industry & Public Enterprise Anant Geet on the occasion of the Make in India Week held in Mumbai, Maharashtra.
This is for the first time, Union Government (Ministry of Heavy Industry & Public Enterprise) has framed such national policy for the capital goods sector.
Key features of Policy

• Increase exports of capital goods from the current 27% to 40 % of production.
• Increase share of domestic capital goods production in terms of demand from 60% to 80% in order to make India a net exporter of capital goods.
• Facilitate improvement in technology depth across sub-sectors, ensure mandatory standards, increase skill availability and promote growth and capacity building of MSMEs.
• Seeks to address some of the key issues including availability of finance, raw material, productivity, quality and environment friendly manufacturing practices, innovation and technology, creating domestic demand and promoting exports.
• Enhance Indian made capital goods export through a ‘Heavy Industry Export & Market Development Assistance Scheme (HIEMDA)’.
• Strengthening existing scheme of DHI (Department of Heavy Industry) on enhancement of competitiveness of Capital Goods sector by increasing budgetary allocation.
• Seeks to launch a Technology Development Fund (TDF), upgrade existing and setting up new testing & certification facility.
• It also seeks to make standards mandatory in order to reduce sub-standard machine imports and provide opportunity to local manufacturing units and launch scheme of skill development for Capital Goods sector.

Month: Current Affairs - February, 2016