Cheap imports are harming India’s rubber industry and the government should introduce safeguards to protect domestic players, United Planters Association of Southern India (UPASI) said on Thursday.
India has shown maximum negative growth in production, a 21-per cent dip, among the all the rubber producing countries, the association said.
N Dharmaraj, president, UPASI, attributed this trend to low prices and high production cost, compared to other producing countries. He added that the below 600,000-tonne projected production for 2015-16 is due to large areas being abandoned due to unremunerative prices.
In 2014-15, import was 76 per cent of production and 43 per cent of consumption, he said. At the end of October 2015, the stock with growers was only 66,000 tonnes, an insignificant quantity considering that there are 1.2 million growers involved in growing natural rubber, he said. The stocks — with dealers, processors and manufacturers — was 162,000 tonnes, he claimed. Dharmaraj made UPASI’s presentation at a stakeholders meeting in Kochi on Wednesday to discuss the current crisis in the rubber sector.
Stating that dwindling production would not only affect growers’ income but also lead to higher imports, draining the exchequer of valuable foreign exchange, he said unbridled imports beyond a point are clearly causing harm to the domestic sector.
Imposition of maximum bound import duty of 25 per cent was a welcome move as substantially lower international prices has not resulted in lower imports, UPASI said in a release on Thursday.
With damage to domestic industry being evident, government should play its role as regulator and introduce safeguards to limit imports, he said.
He added that the recommendations of Parliamentary standing committee on rubber industry in India have clearly stated that uncontrolled imports are harming domestic growing industry.
UPASI suggested that the committee’s recommendations be implemented in total, since they have considered the views and ascertained facts from all stakeholders.
