Minister Piyush Goyal holds talks with 140 firms receiving production-related incentives
Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal on Sunday held detailed discussions with companies receiving financial benefits under the production linked incentive (PLI) scheme.
The minister discussed with 140 companies out of 1,300 in 14 industries, which are the beneficiaries of this program.
“We have estimated that in 14 sectors, an investment of around Rs 1.46 lakh crore will be invested…Our estimate is that we can look at an investment of more than Rs 2 lakh crores invested through the incentive scheme linked to production (over the whole scheme. period),” Goyal told reporters after the meeting.
On the employment side, he added that initially it was estimated that 8.5 lakh jobs would be created under the PLI scheme, but if we look at the figures mentioned by some of them, “we can easily look at about 12 lakh jobs (jobs)”.
“We were also expecting to see an additional production of Rs 11 lakh crore. But hearing some of the numbers today, my sense is for domestic demand and exports, the production will also be more than what we had expected,” he added.
The minister said that the units in these sectors are doing well and are now in a position to invest, even without additional funding for the production ecosystem, because the demand has started to be generated.
At the meeting, the firms presented their proposals including some amendments to government procurement.
“Overall, the policy is the same, but there are certain sectors where the ecosystem takes time to develop, and initially the domestic value add decreases. Gradually it increases. That was a good proposal, and I asked my officials to examine it. or we can have a guide for these sectors that they can change to be tier 1 or tier 2 suppliers,” said Goyal.
The requirement of previous experience in participating in government procurement for manufacturers making certain products for the first time in India or something new may be challenging.
“Obviously, if they are doing it for the first time in India, or something new is happening for the first time in India, it is very difficult to have prior knowledge,” he said, adding, “I have asked. through laboratory tests or other things can be qualified to start supplying, being a new product or a new product without previous experience”.
The government has launched the program in 2021 in 14 sectors including electronics, pharma, white goods, telecommunications and drones with an estimated cost of Rs 1.97 lakh crore. It aims to increase domestic production, attract investors and increase exports.
