Monitoring India's Economic Pulse

Just when things were about to normalize, India has been struck with an upsurge in the covid-19 cases that is now likely to shake the country’s economic pulse. Not wanting to re-witness a large-scale disruption in the supply chain and exodus of laborers that took place last year, MSME associations across the nation met with the policy thinkers this week to put forth the issues plaguing this sector.

Simultaneously, Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal convened a meeting with the export promotion council where he called upon the exporters to attain an ambitious growth of 25% to reach US$ 400 billion merchandise exports in the current year. Despite the covid-crisis grappling India, Commerce Secretary Anup Wadhawan feels the country's exports are reviving and the shipments are expected to be in the 'solid' positive territory in this financial year.

Even though the government claimed the waiting time at Indian ports has reduced, a 58% equipment shortage has forced ports to buy old container boxes at exorbitant prices. Experts highlighted the need to increase the domestic production of these metal boxes which we hope will give relief to the trading community.

Covid-19: How the second wave threatens to nip India’s economic recovery in the bud

Despite being battered by the national lockdown last year and continuing lockdowns in many areas, many key sectors had bounced back and were struggling to cope with the pent-up demand that had been unleashed. Things were looking good — the pandemic had eased considerably with daily cases at a fraction of their peak levels and a nationwide vaccination drive on in full earnest. The nightmare that was 2020 was fading in the rear view mirror. The second wave of the Covid pandemic, however, is threatening to bring that recovery to a grinding halt.

Despite surge in cases, govt targets 25% export growth

The government on Tuesday set an ambitious export growth target of 25%, shrugging off fears of a higher Covid infection rate even as it rejected the US move to put India on the currency manipulator watchlist.

Container prices surge in India as supply chain logjam tightens supply

Container shortages, which have been adding to logistics logjams in Asia and beyond, are showing few signs of being resolved, according to the latest data from Container xChange, a global online platform for the leasing and trading of shipping containers.

Battered by Covid curbs, MSMEs seek definite assurance from Govt

As pandemic wreaks havoc across small businesses, representatives of the MSME sector have reached out to the government, seeking definite words of assurance on their key challenges.

Textile MSMEs see uncertainty in production capacity ahead after recovering to near pre-Covid levels

MSMEs in the textile sector, which had recovered to up to 90 per cent of their pre-Covid production capacity before the second wave struck in March this year, are staring at business uncertainty in the coming weeks. Post lockdown, which led to a contraction in business activity, MSMEs had started to recover back in September with an increase in yarn prices. The recovery had hit around 80 per cent of the production capacity by December last year. However, with fresh Covid restrictions including lockdown, night curfew, weekend curfew, etc., across the country, MSMEs are fearing a decline in production capacity again.