After having failed to pressurise union textile ministry to rationalise minimum support price (MSP) of cotton, ginners, spinners and other players associated with cotton industry are now demanding export incentives from Centre government.
A 12-member delegation comprising of representatives from ginning and spinning industry held meeting with union commerce minister Kamal Nath last week. The industry players demanded that the Centre government should provide export incentives to ginners and spinners to overcome the problem of firm cotton prices.
“We have demanded incentives under duty draw back scheme and Duty Entitlement Passbook Scheme (DEPB). We have asked for benefits of 5 per cent and 3 per cent under DEPB and duty draw back scheme respectively. We hope a positive action by Centre government in this regard,” said president, All Gujarat Ginners Association, Dilip Patel, who was also a part of the delegation.
Firm cotton prices are giving sleepless nights to ginners and spinners. "Even at the MSP level, Indian cotton is relatively costlier in the internation market. Export incentives would provide a level playing field to local cotton exporters in the international market," he added.
Owners of around 4,000 ginning units in the country have been demanding some relief from Centre in lieu of higher MSP of cotton. Earlier, the ginners had called a two-day strike to protest higher MSP but their protest was nipped in the bud. Union textile minister Shanker Sinh Vaghela couple of days back refused to bring down cotton MSP and he even went to the extent of saying that ginners could close their units if they wished to do so.
With their efforts to bring cotton MSP down failing to yield any results, they have approached commerce ministry for export incentives.