Commerce Ministry reviewing existing guidelines of EPCs, FIEO

Cont’d. from Pg. 4

The panel is likely to take about two months to complete the exercise andsubmititsrecommendations.

The memorandum said that till amendmentoftheexistingguidelines on the basis of the recommendations of the committee, EPCs/FIEO (Federation of Indian Export Organisations)mayputonholdallthe elections which are in process, includingthosewherenoresultshave beendeclaredwithimmediateeffect.

FIEO already elected a vice-president in March. Election for thepresidentpostwasduethisyear.

Different export promotion councils include EEPC India, Export

Promotion Council for EOUs & SEZs, Project EPC, Basic Chemicals, Cosmetics and Dyes Export Promotion Council, Chemicals and Allied Products Export Promotion Council (CAPEXIL), Council for Leather Exports, Sports Goods Export Promotion Council, and Gem and Jewellery Export Promotion Council.

The other councils include Shellac Export Promotion Council, Cashew Export Promotion Council of India, The Plastics Export Promotion Council, Pharmaceutical Export Promotion Council, Indian Oil Seeds And Produce Export Promotion

Council (IOPEPC), and Services EPC.

FIEOwassetupin1965asanapex body of export promotion in the country. It has been designated as registeringauthorityforstatusholder exporting firms and other exporters dealinginmulti-products.

It also issues Certificate of Origin which is required by many countries asproofoforiginofthegoods.

Commenting on the exercise, former FIEO President S C Ralhan said the changes should be implementedprospectively.

"There should not be any major change in the existing guidelines," hesaid.

Indian Railways to rationalise Container Tariff to attract more Cargo

NEW DELHI: With the aim of increasing container movement substantially, Indian Railways is finalising new policy initiatives and rating structure to include more commoditiesinfreightbasket.

The proposed policy envisages changes in the existing one with introduction of new types of goods carriers such as double stack dwarf container, cube container and open top container besides rationalisation ofcontainerrates.

Container tariff is being rationalisedtobringmoreharmonyin the container ecosystem, said a seniorRailwayMinistryofficial.

Indian Railways has an ambitious plan of increasing loading from 4.14 million tonnes (MT) to 6 MT per day. In 2022-23, the railways has achieved 1,512 MT which is 4.14 MT perday.

Now according to the plan, the railways wants to increase the loading to 6 MT per day in order to achieve2,200MTby2025.

Accordingtotherailways,inorder to achieve this, the national transporter has to target freight commodities which are traditionally not coming to the rail system. To achieve this, the railways cannot relyonmineralsandoressuchasiron oreandcoalonly.

As per the National Rail Plan, in the national freight ecosystem nearly 35to40percentisthebalanceofother goods.Thisisroughly2,000MT.

However, the railways barely capture3to4percentofthisbalance. If the railways has to achieve 6 MT per day, it needs to capture at least20percentofthebalanceofother goodsinthenationalecosystem.

Other goods include automobiles, white goods, FMCG, electronics, commercialfoodgrains,agriproducts andengineeringgoodsamongothers.

The existing railway wagons including covered ones are not suited to capturing this traffic. In addition, the railways owned terminals are also notideallysuitedtocapturethistraffic.

Therefore, the railways is relying on containerisation to attract other goods.

Since the Covid-19 pandemic, the railways has taken many initiatives covering both container operation and its rating to increase container traffic.

However,outofthetotalcontainer traffic of the railways, nearly 70 per cent to 80 per cent is exportimport traffic. A very small percentageisdomestictraffic.

So, the railways is planning to bring in policy initiatives and rating structure that will increase domestic containermovementsubstantially.

Accordingly, a new approach in both policy and rating of container traffic is being worked out in the Railway Board and likely to be announced soon. The idea is to include more commodities in containers with the introduction of more types of containers such as doublestackdwarfandcubeandopen topcontainer.