Economy

Guided by the urgent need to save lives -‘Jaanhaitoh Jahan hai’, India resorted to a strict 21 days nationwide lockdown on 24thMarch, 2020 to contain the spread of COVID-19 in its early stages in the country. The lockdown period gave a respite to ramp up the health and testing infrastructure in the country. Due to timely tracing, treatment and reporting, the number of people recovering from the virus is continuously rising and the active cases, as on date, are 41% of the total cases in the country.

Shri Ajit Kumar, Chairman, Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs (CBIC) here yesterday unveiled a Secure QR coded Shipping Bill that would be electronically sent to exporters after the Customs allows export. This eliminates in one stroke the requirement of the exporters having to approach the Customs officers for proof of export. This also makes the end to end Customs export process fully electronic, from the filing of the Shipping Bill to the final order to allow export.

This is the world’s only available derivatives contract for trading in almonds that comes after Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ‘vocal for local’ call. For this reason, it is anticipating global interest.

The kharif or summer-sown season, has witnessed an increase in crop planting by 40 per cent year-on-year, helped by the strong start of the monsoon season. This increase in planting has been led by oilseeds and coarse cereals. The boost is been provided by increase in rainfall. Rainfall since June 1 has been 31 per cent higher than that a year ago.

The government has sought product-wise details of cheap imports, comparison with domestic prices and tax disadvantage, if any, from industry to curb low quality inbound shipments especially from China and boost domestic manufacturing, sources said.