New Delhi, April 9 The Ministry of Commerce held meetings with exporters on Thursday to discuss challenges related to packaging, shipping, and port operations amid the West Asia crisis, an official said.
Commerce Secretary Rajesh Agrawal chaired two meetings, which were attended by representatives of export promotion councils and commodity boards.
The Commerce Secretary, along with the Shipping Secretary Vijay Kumar, discussed issues related to ports and shipping in the context of the ongoing challenges, with the aim of exploring feasible solutions, according to industry officials.
The export promotion councils (EPCs) were requested to share specific issues or challenges being faced at ports so that these could be effectively addressed during the discussions.
The joint attack launched by the US and Israel on Iran had led to severe disruptions in the movement of ships in international waters, particularly to West Asian nations.
The second meeting was held to deliberate on key packaging challenges faced by the industry arising from the evolving situation in West Asia and to identify operational responses.
According to industry players, rising prices of petrochemicals have led to a surge in raw material costs, resulting in a 50 per cent increase in the prices of packaging materials in the past few weeks.
The issues discussed included measures to enhance food exports in the current global supply scenario, strategies to address shortages of packing materials across sectors, and key trade issues arising from the Middle East crisis, along with suggested remedial measures.
Exporters suggested that the waivers granted by ports and other stakeholders should be passed transparently to the trade, and that all agencies should provide this benefit upfront rather than charging first and then refunding.
They also urged that the Rs 497-crore RELIEF scheme of ECGC (Export Credit Guarantee Corporation) should cover other countries like Egypt, for which shipping lines have announced war surcharges.
The government launched the RELIEF (Resilience & Logistics Intervention for Export Facilitation) scheme last month to help exporters overcome the disruptions caused by the West Asia conflict.
They also suggested that bunker facilities could be provided at Paradeep and Vizag ports, and that easy "return to town" facilities should be extended to containers offloaded at foreign ports, as customs is asking to follow a cumbersome reimport process.