Joint Director-General of Foreign Trade (DGFT) S.B.S. Reddy on Thursday exhorted exporters to do value addition to their products before exporting them to ensure remunerative price.
“We have spinning mills in Guntur. Rice exports are done from different places. Prakasam and Chittoor are known for granite exports, while Rayalseema is known for horticultural exports. This is the potential we have in the State, but we are not getting the required value for our products,” he said while addressing at a workshop organised by The Andhra Chambers of Commerce and Industry Federation on ‘Niryat Bandhu’.
‘Niryat Bandhu’ is an initiative of the DGFT for mentoring young entrepreneurs in international trade.
Mr. Reddy said several exporters in the region were accustomed to basic exports only but not utilising the potential in doing value addition to the products.
For instance, turmeric is exported from Guntur on a large scale at cost of over Rs. 50 a kg.
However, traders importing turmeric from India were able to get Rs. 5,000 a kg after extracting required material from it. Same is the case with chilli.
In his power-point presentation, he explained about various schemes in the export policy and later, clarified doubts of a few exporters. Federation is organising a similar programme on March 13 in Rajahmundry.