Solar Industry Seeks Manufacturing Incentives in New Budget

AISIA in its pre-budget recommendations has called for the inclusion of incentives such as subsidies for power, capital, etc in the new budget.

The All India Solar Industries Association (AISIA) in its pre-budget recommendations has called for the ministry of finance to include incentives such as subsidies for power, capital, financial support in interest and depreciation to the industry as well as allowing duty-free import of manufacturing equipment.

The group, which comprises of over 18 of the leading local solar manufactures said in its pre-budget recommendations that this is the right time to give these incentives because the future of the industry is at stake.

AISIA said in a statement that the existence of the solar module creator manufacturer is at stake, it has suggested that this is the right time to promote manufacturing. The Association recommended increasing the export promotion from 2 percent to at least 10 percent to take advantage of the ‘Make in India’ initiative for the Indian solar module manufacturing sector.

The recommendations come in the backdrop of the last fiscal year with major issues of imported modules, as well as components, at ‘dumping’ prices, from China, Malaysia, Singapore and Taiwan, and bypassing the safeguard duty tariff, apart from issues of GST and SDG. 

“All this hope would come to naught if the basic tariff issues are not resolved in the Budget. It is time India took a definitive step in the anti-dumping war that is currently raging in the solar energy sector. A potential solution could be to create a high trade value against cheap imports from countries like China and/or countervailing duty, to offset the huge subsidies offered by China to its solar manufacturers or offering preferential tariffs to domestic solar equipment manufacturers,” AISIA issued in a statement.

The industry estimates that the minimum safeguard duty to ensure the sustainability of this sector should be 45 percent to enable it to achieve the nation’s goal. The need of the hour is a set of favourable policies that will foster rapid growth for the solar power industry.