The Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman presented the full budget 2024 today before the parliament at 11 am. She announced several measures to reduce customs duties, aimed at enhancing local value addition and export competitiveness.
A significant part of the new budget includes revising customs duty rates on various commodities, ranging from life-saving medicines to rare earth minerals and mobile phones. Sitharaman revealed that over the next six months, a comprehensive review of the customs duty rate structure would be undertaken to simplify trade, address duty inversion, and reduce disputes.
One of the major changes is the reduction of customs duties on gold and silver from 15 percent to 6 percent, and on platinum from 15.4 percent to 6.4 percent. These changes aim to boost domestic value addition in the gold and precious metal jewellery sector. Additionally, the basic customs duty (BCD) on ferro nickel and blister copper has been removed to lower production costs for steel and copper industries.
FM noted a significant increase in domestic production and exports of mobile phones over the past six years. To further benefit consumers and support this growth, she proposed reducing the BCD on mobile phones, mobile PCBAs, and mobile chargers to 15 percent.
The Minister also announced full exemption of customs duties on 25 critical minerals and a reduction in BCD on two of them. These minerals are essential for sectors such as space, defence, telecommunications, high-tech electronics, nuclear energy, and renewable energy.
In an effort to promote the renewable energy sector, the budget expands the list of exempted capital goods used in manufacturing solar cells and panels. However, due to sufficient domestic manufacturing capacity, the exemption on customs duties for solar glass and tinned copper interconnect will not be extended.
To enhance the competitiveness of seafood exports, the budget proposed reducing the BCD on certain broodstock, polychaete worms, shrimp, and fish feed to 5 percent. Additionally, various inputs for the manufacture of shrimp and fish feed are exempted from customs duty.
The budget also includes reductions and exemptions for various leather raw materials to boost exports in the leather and textile sectors. The export duty structure on raw hides, skins, and leather is set to be simplified and rationalised, further supporting these industries.
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