The Prime Minister’s Office (PMO), on Monday, announced that the mandatory sourcing requirement for private companies — also known as the Preferential Market Access (PMA) policy — will be revisited as well as reviewed, and a new re-calibrated policy would be brought before the Cabinet for approval.
The PMO had, on July 5, put on hold the preferential market access policy following strong protests by international trade associations besides the domestic telecom industry.
The PMO came out with a statement stating that it would review and revisit the policy of asking companies, mainly in the telecom sector, to compulsorily source domestically-manufactured electronic goods. The PMA mandated a phased increase in procurement from domestic manufacturers for telecom companies.
“The entire policy on providing preference to domestically-manufactured electronic goods (PMA Policy) will be revisited and reviewed. The overall policy on PMA will be recalibrated and submitted to the Cabinet. No notifications on PMA in the private sector on security- related products will be issued till the PMA policy is reviewed, and any notifications in the draft stage will be withheld,’’ a statement by the PMO said here.
The PMA policy approved by the Cabinet on February 2, 2012, had called for providing preference to domestically-manufactured electronic products in procurement of those electronic products which have security implications for the country and in government procurement for its own use. However, the policy faced opposition from U.S.-based groups where the government itself had limited imports of technology product from Chinese companies on security grounds, including cyber espionage threat.
The PMA policy has two aspects — government procurement and private sector procurement. While the government has issued notifications on sourcing of certain products, it had put on hold all the notifications that were to be issued with respect to private sector procurement.
The PMO has called for a major change in the new PMA policy of removing the entire clause regarding preference to domestic manufacturer on security-related products that are to be used by private sector. “The revised proposal on PMA in the private sector for security-related products will not have domestic manufacturing requirements, percentage based or otherwise. The PMO has asked the Department of Electronics and Information Technology to bring a final note to the Cabinet on the revised policy within four weeks,’’ it added.
