Ayush Export Promotion Council to be set up

The Minister of Commerce and Industry, Piyush Goyal, informed the Parliament that AYUSH ministry is holding consultations with the stakeholder to explore the setting up of an AYUSH Export Promotion Council (EPC). The government is also exploring the procedural steps which would be involved in setting up the council.

Highlights

In a reply, the minister said that, the “Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI)” has been tasked to coordinate with the Department of Commerce and the Indian Industry members who have shown their interest in forming the corpus for AYUSH export promotion council. Ministry of AYUSH has also set up a task force to expand the trade classification, quality control and standardization of Indian Systems of Medicine (ISM) & Herbal Products. The recommendations provided by the task force are under examination by the government current.

HS Codes

The minister also highlighted that, most of the products of Ayurveda, Homoeopathic, Siddha, Unani systems, Sowa Rigpa, Medicinal plant products and Herbal Products are not identified under the specific HS Codes. Thus, the government is taking several steps to standardize the of HS Code for AYUSH in order to achieve price and quality competitiveness which in turn will boost the exports. HS Code is an International Harmonised Commodity Description & Coding System and an international nomenclature to classify the products. This code allows the participating countries to classify the traded goods on common basis for the purposes of customs.

Why this council is being set up?

The AYUSH product is gaining popularity across the world because of which the exports of AYUSH products have also increased. Thus, there is a need to upscale the AYUSH sector so as to meet the growing demands from India and world. Thus, the export promotion council is being set up to manage the export related aspects of the AYUSH Products.

Month: Current Affairs - March, 2021