India's global merchandise trade to touch $750 bn in FY'12

NEW DELHI: India's merchandise trade is on way to touch USD 750 billion in the current fiscal, accounting for 68 per cent of the country's USD 1.1 trillion economy which is fast integrating with the rest of the world.

"We are on course, when it comes to India's overall trade...the two-way trade crossed USD 600 billion last year and must cross, as per my assessment, USD 750-760 billion, that is excluding trade in services," Commerce and Industry Minister Anand Sharma said here today.

Opening textile fair 'Tex Trends India,2012', he said the country's exports are expected to reach USD 300 billion.

In the nine-month April-December period, the outward shipments aggregated USD 217.6 billion with year-on-year growth of 25.8 per cent.

Likewise, growing by 30.4 per cent imports were USD 350.9 billion in the same period.

"If you get USD 80 billion exports in the remaining quarter (January-March, 2012), you are looking at close to USD 300 billion..and imports may touch about USD 460 billion," Commerce Secretary Rahul Khullar said earlier this week.

Referring to the performance of textile exports,Sharma said the shipments are likey to touch USD 33 billion in the current fiscal.

During 2010-11,textiles sector achieved exports of USD 26.8 billion.