Shedding light on the challenges faced by the capital goods industry many experts spoke about its adverse effects leading to loss of employment, investment and growth opportunities and the need for SMEs and MSMEs to upgrade their technologies at a meet on July 4th. In the light of emerging challenges, it has become imperative for India to upgrade technologies, especially among its SMEs and MSMEs which form the backbone of Indian engineering export, said experts.

They were speaking at a technology meet organised jointly by the Department of Commerce, EEPC India in partnership with National Research Development Corporation (NRDC) and Chamber of Marathwada Industries and Agriculture (CMIA).

“loss of employment, investment and growth opportunities and also high cost of conversion,” said CMIA President Gurpreet Singh Bagga.

“In the light of emerging challenges, it has become imperative for India to upgrade technologies, especially among its SMEs and MSMEs which form the backbone of Indian engineering export. To overcome these constraints, the department of commerce, ministry of commerce and industry have undertaken an initiative for technological upgradation for boosting engineering exports with EEPC India as the implementing agency. The Department of Heavy Industries (DHI), has agreed to extend its support to the initiative through its scheme for global competitiveness of capital goods sector. Under the scheme, the grant of up to 80% is to be provided to the institutions for setting up and strengthening the technology development infrastructure and common manufacturing and services infrastructure,” he explained.

The meeting consisted of two sessions. In the first session, there were industry presentations on needs of technologies, common facilities other interventions by CMIA Aurangabad entrepreneurs, while in the second session, the Aurangabad industry interacted with technology providers and developers.

Speaking at the meet N Ramakrishnan, deputy secretary, department of commerce said, “It is the initiative of department of commerce and the goal is to improve the global Indian export ranking, change the mind set of reverse engineering, break the jinx of being a Technology follower and move into Technology leader space and achieve the winning aspirations of engineering exporters through scientific community.”

He also mentioned that India is targeting to double its share in world trade from 1.7% to 3.5% by 2020.

Meanwhile, senior development officer, Department of Heavy Industry, GoI, Sanjay Chavre made a presentation on Scheme for Global Competitiveness of Indian Capital Goods Sector.

He briefed on the capital goods guidelines on technology development and technology acquisition and its procedures. It was also briefed on the Scheme for Global Competitiveness of Capital Goods Sector during the session.

Rajat Srivastava, Regional Director, EEPC INDIA briefed on the activities eligible for financial assistance under MAI and Research and Product Development and its salient features.

Aurangabad cluster stressed the need to emphasis on imparting skill development training in educational institutes and develop courses for students to work in industry for practical knowledge and collectively develop new machines as 90% of electronics is imported in India and must develop new electronic products.

Industry representatives also expressed their desire to develop the technologies in the fields of auto electronic, automation and machining related technology, welding, sheet metal press and fabrications and assembly.

Source: The Times of India