The Cotton Textiles Export Promotion Council (Texprocil) has appealed to the Union Textile Minister Piyush Goyal to remove the Customs Duty on cotton as it is mainly the extra-long staple branded cotton and contamination free cotton that are imported.
Exports of Cotton textiles (including raw cotton) during 2020-2021 reached US$ 10,723 million as against US$ 9,799 million in 2019-20, registering 9.43 % growth.
On the Indo-UK Free Trade Agreement, the Council urged the Minister to include textiles and clothing sector upfront in the “pre-negotiation scoping phase” or any envisaged “early harvest” programme to overcome the disadvantage faced by the Indian exporters due to duty concessions already granted by the UK to Bangladesh , Pakistan, Vietnam, Turkey and Sri Lanka.
He also sought measures to expedite the Indo- EU Free Trade Agreement to help the Indian exporters overcome the disadvantages of tariff preferences given to competing countries by European Union.