AHMEDABAD: The new foreign trade policy to be announced by Union Minister for Commerce and Industry Kamal Nath on April 7 will continue the thrust on generating employment opportunities.

Mr. Kamal Nath, who was the chief guest at an award presentation ceremony at the Ahmedabad Management Association, took pride in the fact that the shift in the foreign trade policy two years ago from mere "dollar-generating orientation" to "employment generation" had paid rich dividends. The country's exports had grown by an unprecedented 26 per cent for the two continuous years and this year it was expected to touch the $100 billion mark. The incremental exports had also created about 2.5 million new job opportunities in the past two years.

He believed that this spinoff effects in the economy were positive signs and had contributed significantly in the sensex boom being witnessed in the country. He believed that mere export earnings were not absorbed in the country's economy and unless the trade policy helped increase economic activities and create employment opportunities, it could not lead to the sustainable and balanced growth of the country.

He agreed that the country's import bill was also on the rise, but that helped the manufacturing sector and created large employment opportunities. The economy should grow at 12 per cent in manufacturing to create five million jobs a year and every job in production creates three service jobs. The manufacturing sector contributes about 11 per cent of the GDP which needs to be taken to about 20 to 25 per cent to create about 20 million jobs a year.

China's growth

Mr. Kamal Nath disfavoured competing with China but said India and China together were destined to control the world trade. He said China with its mass manufacturing and export-driven economy gets 10 times as much foreign direct investment (FDI) as India and had four times more exports but was only a percentage point or two ahead in economic growth because India with its vast resources of talent and genius had the potential to grow faster with a convergence on high value production of goods.

Projecting India as the future hub of Knowledge Process Outsourcing (KPO), he said not only the vast market that India possessed was attracting international business and finance, but the world's leading industries were now seeking those skills and talent that were being reared within the country. The once negative phenomena, brain drain, which earlier adversely affected the country's development, had been reversed and India's prestige and stake in the human resource development market had risen. "It is with an exalted pride we can assert that Indian expertise is everywhere today," he said.

Farm growth

He admitted that the agricultural sector, in which 65 per cent of the population was engaged but contributes only 23 per cent of the GDP, was still a matter of concern for the country and need to be corrected. It was precisely on this ground that India took a strong stand at the World Trade Organisation where so far the developed countries wrote the rules of the game but now the countries like India were writing the script. Unless the imbalance was removed, how could the farmers in India and African countries compete when the United States provides 42 per cent subsidy to its cotton growers, he asked.

Later laying the foundation stone for the National Institute of Design's post graduate campus in Gandhinagar to be constructed at a cost of Rs. 20 crores, he said a comprehensive national design policy and setting up of a National Design Council would soon be announced by the Centre.

The proposed policy, he said, would provide a "good design" selection system to encourage optimal use of design by industries and other sectors as well as a roadmap for standardising and spreading design education through co-ordinated programmes in various IITs, NITs, leading universities and the technical skill institutes besides the NID. The policy would also outline a framework for the recognition, registration and advancement of the design profession, he said.

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