CII Seeks Cut in Customs Duty on Furniture
Industry body Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) on December 30 put forth several recommendations on behalf of the retail sector ahead of the upcoming Union Budget in February, among them a call to reduce custom duties on furniture imports, overhauling of local testing facilities for import of certain items such as toys, and enabling pan-India return of goods in stores. CII’s Pre-budget Memorandum for the fiscal 2021-22 listed several points that the country’s $854 billion retail trade could benefit from. Earlier this year, the government had moved to hike custom duties on imported furniture to 25% from 20% to safeguard the interests of India’s micro, small & medium enterprises. The announcement was made as part of the government’s Union Budget 2020-21. CII’s set of recommendations said higher taxes are detrimental for most retailers as it prevents them from keeping costs low for end consumers. Recently, customs duty on furniture products and raw material to manufacture furniture products has been increased substantially. This has resulted into disturbance in the furniture industry. This further has resulted into inflation for the final customers. While tariff increases result in higher cost of imports, they reduce incentives for keeping the cost of production down. This puts a brake on plans to make products affordable to customers and make more in India initiatives.
Tags : ALLIED CII furniture Customs Duty Industry body Confederation of Indian Industry