India sees enough purchasing power in its domestic market: Union Minister Nirmala Sitharaman

New Delhi, Apr 11 (KNN) Indian manufacturers have realised that there is an opportunity which lies, one from the consumer point of view that even within India, there’s enough purchasing power, said Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Monday.

Responding to a question by American think-tank Peterson Institute for International Economics, she said Indians have always had this difficulty in having to come back to producing certain things which are your day-to-day domestic necessities, but you are unable to produce because you find cheaper imports coming or the very same requirement.

“But now there’s enough purchasing power. And many of these goods which can be produced in India will have a definitive large consumer base within the country,” she said.

The Finance Minister is in the United States for a week-long official visit.

So, catering to the domestic market itself has become now attractive for many of those producers who wouldn’t have produced such things which were otherwise available for cheap from outside, she noted.

She also called for making globalization more transparent and said it’s not to say that we have to reverse the benefits of globalization.

For a very long time, it has been India’s attempts to make sure its manufacturing sector grows. “We have a big play. We also don’t import final consumer goods, which we are capable of manufacturing. However, when you have price discrepancies or price competitiveness affecting your purchasing decisions, you end up buying those which you can produce because they come at a far more, cheaper rate,” she said.  (KNN Bureau)