India to miss $200 bn export target: Assocham

NEW DELHI: Industry body Assocham has said that India may miss the $200 billion export target for 2010-11 due to sluggish demand in Europe, contrary to the government's assertion of meeting the target.

"India's exports would be around $180 billion against the target level of $200 billion by the end 2010-2011," Assocham Secretary General D S Rawat said in a statement.

The sluggish demand in several European countries would adversely affect India's exports, the chamber said. Europe accounted for about $39 billion of the $179 billion exports in the last fiscal.

Exports in the first four months of the fiscal totalled $68.6 billion.

While announcing the annual supplement to Foreign Trade Policy on August 23, Commerce and Industry Minister Anand Sharma had expressed confidence that India would be able to achieve the target.

"We are on course to achieving export target ($200 billion) for 2010-11," he said.

Even, the Prime Minister's Economic Advisory Council (PMEAC) in its latest outlook said the exports could touch $216 billion this fiscal.

Assocham, however, said that with the countries like Spain and Portugal going in for fiscal consolidation, exports to the European Union is likely to take a backseat.

While the government is confident of achieving the $200 billion exports, it too has expressed apprehensions of a slowdown as the developed countries may go for fiscal consolidation by partially rolling back the economic stimulus packages.

After posting a robust growth of over 32 per cent in the first quarter of this fiscal, exports growth slipped to 13.2 per cent in July.

India's exports entered into positive territory in November 2009, after contracting for 13 months in a row due to global economic slowdown.