According to a notification issued by the Indian government, incentives including duty refunds for steel and cement exports will be in effect again as of November 14, in order to help restore confidence in these industries.
Exporters of cement and several steel items, including HRC and HRS as well as CRC, HDG and pig iron, will again be entitled to tax refunds through the Duty Entitlement Passbook Scheme (DEPB). Accordingly, the DEPB rates will be three percent on pig iron, six percent on CRC, HGI, PPGI, four percent on ferrochrome and ferromanganese, and five percent on sponge iron, in terms of their FOB-based export value.
The government had suspended the export subsidiary for steel under the DEPB scheme as of March 27 of the current year in a move to control inflation and increase domestic supplies.
The objective of the DEPB is to neutralize the incidence of customs duty on the import content of the export product. The neutralization shall be provided by way of a grant of duty credit against the export product.
The two sectors in question have also been included in the Focus Market Scheme of the government, enabling these distressed industries to boost their exports to the third world.