Articles by "Suresh Prabhu"
New Delhi, Oct 3: Commerce and Industry Minister Suresh Prabhu will chair an inter-ministerial meeting Thursday to discuss the depreciating rupee and widening trade deficit, an official said.
The meeting will deliberate upon ways to address India's trade deficit in goods and pressure on the rupee, the official added.
Representatives from the department of economic affairs, coal ministry, steel ministry, oil ministry and department of pharmaceuticals are expected to attend the meeting.
The meeting assumes significance as the rupee has hit an all-time high of 73.74 against the US dollar, which would raise India's import bill and widen the trade deficit (difference between imports and exports).
The trade deficit was at a five-year high of USD 18.02 billion in July. It came down to USD 17.4 billion in August.
During the April-August period this fiscal, the country's exports recorded a growth of 16.13 per cent, while imports grew by 17.34 per cent.
The depreciating rupee puts pressure on the country's oil import bill.
The domestic currency has depreciated nearly 13 per cent since the beginning of this year. Besides having impact on current account deficit, the sliding rupee has made imports costlier and led to oil prices skyrocketing to record highs. India is the third largest importer of crude oil.
Oil imports during the first five months of the current fiscal rose by 53.55 per cent to USD 58.81 billion.
Since 2011-12, India's exports have been hovering at around USD 300 billion. During 2017-18, the shipments grew by about 10 per cent to USD 303 billion.
Promoting exports helps a country to create jobs, boost manufacturing and earn more foreign exchange. (PTI)
Kolkata, July 07 : Union Minister for Commerce and Civil Aviation Suresh Prabhu today sought to dispel the notion of other countries that India subsidised its exports.
He said that the government was merely trying to mitigate the adversities of the exporters, which did not tantamount to subsidising of exports from India, specifically farm products.
"It is a misconception that we subsidise our exports. We are fully WTO compliant and not at all violating those", Prabhu said at a chat session organised jointly by Shefexil and a leading business daily here.
He said that OECD countries were giving more subsidises to their farmers, particularly in the export of agriculture products.
Talking about agriculture exports, he said "should it not be so that when India exports its agriculture products to other countries, those importing nations deter themselves from subsidising those items".
Stressing on agriculture, Prabhu said it was important to provide market access to the farmers for which the highest standard of safety was needed to overcome the non-tariff barriers (NTBs).
The government was already working on a craft agriculture policy to double farmers' income, he said.
"The commerce department is already working on the development of standards. The standard in the Western countries is very high ", he said.
Unless the highest standard was not adhered to, it would be difficult to do exports, he added.
He also said there would be no market access and realisation of better prices.
Prabhu also said that the ministry was also working on preparing an integrated logistics plan to reduce costs and increase speed and efficiency.
Earlier speaking at a CII event, he said that the ministry was preparing separate plans for the manufacture of drones and planes in the country.
New Delhi, Nov 24: Charging Union Ministers -- Nitin Gadkari and
Suresh Prabhu -- of being a part of the national executive committee of a
company floated by Mr Gadkari's private secretary Vaibhav Dange, the Congress
on Friday said both the ministers violated the code of conduct for Union
Ministers.
Talking to the reporters here, AICC spokesperson
Jairam Ramesh -- alleging that the Indian Federation of Green Energy, a firm
floated by Union Minister Nitin Gadkari’s Private Secretary Vaibhav Dange, had
raised funds from government departments and state-owned entities -- said it
was a matter pertaining to a conflict of interest of Mr Nitin Gadkari.Posing several questions to Mr Gadkari and Mr
Prabhu, Mr Jairam Ramesh said, 'isn't conflict of interest of Mr Nitin Gadkari
writ large?
Have not Mr Nitin Gadkari as also Mr Suresh
Prabhu violated the code of conduct as Union Ministers," he asked.He also questioned as to how Mr Gadkari
permitted his own ministry and PSUs to participate and financially contribute
to a company which is partly owned by his own personal secretary.Mr Ramesh also charged Mr Dange of violating the
Central Civil Service (conducting) Rules, which prohibit a public servant from
accepting contributions and associating with raising of any funds or collection
or cash.Giving details in this regard, Mr Ramesh
said,'on October 9, 2014, Mr Vaibhav Dange, along with Mr Motiram Kisanrao
Patil, floated a company, 'Indian Federation of Green energy' with a paid
capital of Rs 1 lakh.IFGE organises conclaves and programmes with
PSUs and ministers under the control of Mr Gadkari and receives financial
contribution. It also receives contributions from private contributions from
private persons or corporate entities attending or sponsoring therse events and
who deal directly with the ministries controlled by Mr Gadkari. This becomes
even more serious as Mr Vaibhav Dange deals directly with all the ministries
and the PSUS' related issues as also private entities in his capacity as
personal secretary to the Union Cabinet Minister.'He pointed out that IFGE, which started with a
capital of RS 1 lakh only and zero cash as also zero corpus, has a built up
corpus of RS 1.33 crore.
'This company also has cash or cash equivalent
of RS 1.54 crore,' Mr Ramesh said. UNI
New
Delhi, Nov 4: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday took a dig at those
doubting the improvement in India's ranking in World Bank 'ease of doing
business ' index, saying that those who worked with the World Bank are today
raising doubts about India's ranking.
"Today some people are expressing doubts about the improvement in India 's
rankings. Many of these people are those who have worked with the World Bank. I
am the kind of PM who hasn't even seen the World Bank, when earlier people in
my position had run the World Bank,' the PM said at the presentation of India’s
Business Reforms at Pravasi Bharatiya Divas.
In an indirect attack at the previous UPA Government at the Centre, Mr Modi
said, 'I want to tell them that had they done the kind of work we have, this
achievement would have come during their tenure itself. They don’t want to
work, but are quick to question those who do.'
The PM said the reforms undertaken by the NDA Government are far more extensive
than those carried out by the previous government.
'The Opposition didn't do 'big bang' reforms. Now they're without answers,' Mr
Modi said at the event, where World Bank CEO and Commerce Minister Suresh
Prabhu were present. UNI
