7                                      Commerce
           THE Department of Commerce comes under the Ministry of Industry and Commerce. The
      mandate of the Department of Commerce is regulation, development and promotion of India’s
      international trade and commerce through formulation of appropriate international trade and
      commercial policy and implementation of the various provisions thereof. The basic role of the
      Department is to accelerated growth of international trade. The Department formulates,
      implements and monitors the Foreign Trade Policy (FTP) which provides the basic framework of
      policy and strategy to be followed for promoting exports and trade. Besides, the Department is
      also entrusted with responsibilities relating to multilateral and bilateral commercial relations,
      Special Economic Zones, state trading, export promotion and trade facilitation, and development
      and regulation of certain export oriented industries and commodities.
           The long-term vision of the Department is to make India a major player in the world trade
      by 2020 and assume a role of leadership in the international trade organizations commensurate
      with India’s growing importance. The medium term vision is to double India’s exports of goods
      and services by 2017-18 over the level of 2008-09 with a long-term objective of doubling India’s
      share in global trade.
      Relevant Website: www.commerce.gov.in
      Global Scenario
           The global crisis produced a wide-ranging yet differentiated impact across which included
      economic slowdown and contraction in world trade. However, the latest number from WTO now
      points towards healthy prospects for global trade. The estimate for growth in world merchandise
      trade volume in 2017 was raised to 3.6 per cent. The previous estimate for 2017 was 2.4 per cent.
      For 2017 trade growth is placed within a range from 3.2 per cent to 3.9 per cent (WTO, 2017).
      As per the WTO September 2017 press release, stronger than expected growth is driven by Asia
      and North America, where import demand is recovering from weak results in 2016. Trade
      growth should moderate to 3.2 per cent in 2018, within a range from 1.4 to 4.4 per cent, as global
      GDP growth remains stable. Recovery could be undermined by downside risks, including trade
      policy measures, monetary tightening, geopolitical tensions and costly natural disasters. India is
      projected to grow at the rate of 7.4 per cent in 2018 thus becoming the fastest growing economy
      in the world (IMF, 2018). As per the estimates of the International Monetary Fund (IMF, January
      2018), the global economic activity continues to firm up. Global growth, which in 2016 was the
      weakest since the global financial crisis at 3.2 per cent, is projected at 3.9 per cent in 2018 and
      2019. Growth is projected to rise in emerging market and developing economies, supported by
      improved external factors—a benign global financial environment and a recovery in advanced
      economies. Growth in China and other parts of emerging Asia remains strong.
      Current Focus Areas
           Given this positive trajectory of growth, so far as, the export sector is concerned, there are