Save industry of Punjab from RECP: FICO

Ludhiana, October 15, 2019: Delegation of FICO under the leadership of S.Onkar Singh Pahwa Patron in Chief FICO along with Shri K.K.Seth Chairman & S.Gurmeet Singh Kular President FICO met S.Sukhbir Singh Badal Member Parliament & Ex-Deputy CM Punjab, and requested to oppose the ongoing negotiation on Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) to save the MSMEs of Punjab.

S.Gurmeet Singh Kular President FICO explained how the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) is a Free Trade Agreement being negotiated involving 16 countries, namely ten countries of ASEAN (Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam) and their six Free Trade Agreement (FTA) partners i.e. Australia, China, India, Japan, New Zealand and South Korea. Once implemented, the import duty on products being trade between the mentioned countries will be waived off, which simply means that any import from China to India can be done without import duty & will result in the permanent closure of MSMEs from Punjab, as Punjab manufactures the 92% of bicycle & its parts in India. The MSME’s related to bicycle industry generates employment for more than a million people. He further gave the reference of Union Minister of Animal Husbandry, Dairying and Fisheries Shri Giriraj Singh who asked the Government to keep Dairy Sector out of RCEP, and requested S. Sukhbir Singh Badal to save the industry of Punjab.

Shri K. K. Seth Chairman said that there is a 30% import duty on Chinese products being sold in India. Our Indigenous products are still stands No-where when compared to Chinese Products in terms of costing, that too when the import duty of 30% is imposed on the Chinese products. In case the import duty is reduced or removed, the Indian bicycle industry will be wiped off; there won’t be any chance of survival of the industry in India.

S. Sukhbir Singh Badal Member Parliament & Ex. Deputy CM Punjab, after hearing the grievance of the Industry, and assured that he will put up the matter with Ministry, and arrange a meeting with Shri Piyush Goyal. Minister Commerce & Industry and Shri Nitin Gadkari Minister MSME, possibly on 22nd October 2019, and asked a delegation from FICO to be a part of the meeting so that the grass root issues of the industry can be presented to the concerned ministry.

Amongst Present were Sh. D. S. Chawla President UCPMA, S. Sukhdial Singh Basant Chairman FICO Mega Machine Tools Cluster, Shri Vipan Mittal Sr. Vice President FICO, S. Raghbir Singh Sohal Head Plywood Division, S. Gurvinder Singh Sachdeva President Punjab Sanitary & Pipe Manufactures Association, S. Tejvinder Singh Big Ben Executive Member FICO, Sh. Subash Lakra Executive Member FICO, S. Jagdev Singh Kular Executive Member FICO.