India is targeting 11 per cent rise in clothing exports this year. The country’s garment exports were up 12.2 per cent compared to last year. However, in the first two months of the current fiscal, growth rate in apparel exports slowed to just seven per cent from a year earlier. The country’s overall textile and garment exports grew roughly five per cent in the last fiscal, but is still lower than the official target of $45 billion for 2014-15.

The government has set a target for textile and clothing exports at $47.5 billion for 2015-16. However, achieving this target would be difficult unless the government provides adequate policy support, including subsidies, especially after the abolition of certain export subsidies as announced in the recent foreign trade policy for 2015-20.

With demand from crisis-ridden Europe, which accounts for almost 41 per cent of the country’s garment exports, remaining tepid and the chances of a FTA with the EU in the current fiscal still remote, shipment target for the current fiscal would be hard to achieve, especially in view of stiff competition from countries like Vietnam, Bangladesh and Cambodia.