The Hindu : Jaitley seeks consensus on labour reforms

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Apr 02, 2003

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Jaitley seeks consensus on labour reforms

By Our Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI April 1. Seeking a political consensus on labour reforms, the Commerce and Industry Minister, Arun Jaitley, today urged the Opposition parties, especially the Congress, to allow these to go ahead if they were seriously concerned about making the country's exports globally competitive.

Referring to a comment made recently by the Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, Sonia Gandhi, Mr. Jaitley said that talk about Chinese goods flooding the Indian market must be tempered with the realism about the differences in labour laws. "If you want our goods to flood their markets, then let the exporters have same labour laws as China. Don't obstruct labour reforms,'' he added. He underscored the critical need for flexible labour laws which would enable the Indian exporters to have a level-playing field vis-a-vis other countries in terms on international trade. He stressed there is need to make products more competitive by giving the exporters an enabling regime. He said some State Governments had shown openness towards adopting a flexible approach on labour reforms for export-oriented units. "This is a subject where the States must be a participant, cutting across political parties.'' Serious thinking was needed on part of the political parties to evolve a national consensus.

Addressing a FICCI seminar on the Exim Policy 2003-04 here, M. Jaitley said the flooding of goods by the "Chinese dragon" was a myth since the trade gap between the two countries was narrowing.

Later, speaking at a seminar organised by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), he said the 16.76 per cent export growth during April-February 2002-03 was somewhat significant and he expected the final figures for the year to be slightly higher. This was commendable performance by exporters, especially since the rupee had appreciated during the period while war clouds had cast their shadow. Industry had taken numerous initiatives such as cutting costs, improving efficiencies, targeting the right markets and improving product competitiveness. However, the Iraq war would have its own consequences, and could bring down trading sentiments and raise oil prices.

He said the possibility of developing a scheme with features similar to the Special Economic Zones for export-oriented units in select sectors with capital investment in plant and machinery over Rs.25 crores would be explored. He commended the growth of industrial clusters as centres for exports and said these were living examples of the country's enterprise. There were as many as 37 clusters such as Tirupur and Panipat which had come up as a result of individual enterprise and were exporting about Rs. 1,000 crores worth of products each. Measures would be taken to strengthen them.

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