‘Could be a game changer’ — Amazon India wants trade policy tweak to ease exports via e-commerce
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‘Could be a game changer’ — Amazon India wants trade policy tweak to ease exports via e-commerce

Bhupen Wakankar, director of global trade at Amazon India, says e-commerce export is the simplest way for any business to get access to international buyers.

   
Bhupen Wakankar, Director, Global Trade at Amazon India | Amazon India

Bhupen Wakankar, director, global trade at Amazon India | Amazon India

New Delhi: Exports through e-commerce could be a game-changer for India so the foreign trade policy (FTP) needs to help simplify compliance and customs-related processes, said Bhupen Wakankar, director of global trade at Amazon India.

“Traditionally speaking, the foreign trade policy did not account for e-commerce exports and, justifiably so, since the e-commerce exports sector was not mature during the last policy cycle,” Wakankar told ThePrint.

“However, things have changed drastically now. We now have a large pool of e-commerce literate audience as well as sellers who want to be a part of the global value chain.”

Amazon has been running an e-commerce exports programme called Amazon Global Selling in India since 2015. Wakankar said while the programme started with 100 sellers, there are over 1 lakh sellers that export products across categories to customers in more than 200 countries and territories across the world.

The founder and CEO of the US-headquartered marketplace, Jeff Bezos, had announced during his 2020 trip to India that the company will enable cumulative exports of “make in India” goods worth $10 billion by 2025.

In 2022, the company revised the target to $20 billion cumulative exports from India by 2025. 

Noting that e-commerce export is the simplest way for any business to get access to international buyers, Wakankar said enabling the FTP would help bring Indian e-commerce exports on a par with global best practices.

Illustration: Ramandeep Kaur | ThePrint

“We believe that e-commerce exports are a potential pathway to a $400 billion market, where Indian entrepreneurs can directly reach global customers with minimal upfront costs. This could really benefit India’s large MSME sector and startup ecosystem,” he said.

End-to-end digitisation, he added, should be introduced to enable faster clearance of time-sensitive e-commerce export shipments. For smaller sellers to adopt e-commerce exports, the FTP should also include exemptions for re-import of unsold/returned e-commerce goods. This will enable Indian exporters to meet the customer satisfaction levels enjoyed by exporters in other jurisdictions, he said.

Wakankar explained that return is a common feature of e-commerce and unsold inventory that can no longer be stored in warehouses or inventory that was shipped from India but is now being returned due to some issue should be exempt from paying import duties.

“The FTP should consider these instances as ‘reimport without completion of sale’. For this purpose, documents required at the time of exporting should suffice to avail the exemption,” he said.

Wakankar added that Indian exporters on Amazon Global Selling have surpassed $5 billion in cumulative exports, and in 2021, more than 1,000 exporters crossed Rs 1 crore in sales.

“Exports in India for the longest time have been relegated to top markets like the US, UK, and EU. However, we are noticing a lot of demand coming in from emerging markets like the Middle East, Japan, Singapore, Australia as well,” he said.

(Edited by Smriti Sinha)


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