What could you buy with $400 billion? crypto enthusiasts could buy 85 million Bitcoins for starters. football lovers could potentially acquire 100 Manchester City teams, with a $4 billion valuation for each. coffee aficionados could buy 133 billion cups of coffee at their favourite Starbucks, sufficient to feed the entire world’s population for half a month. with that kind of money, the world would be your oyster.
but hold on. are you wondering where did this number suddenly come from? we were just getting to that bit. India has exported $400 billion worth of merchandise as of March 23. exports are at an all-time high, with still a few more days for the financial year to end.
from engineering goods, cotton, coffee, gems & jewellery, and petroleum products, there was a double-digit growth across all categories. with $1 billion worth of exports being done every day, the full-year exports could touch $410 billion.
commerce minister Piyush Goyal gave credit to the ‘Make in India’ program that is helping India manufacture for domestic and international use.
dipping into the numbers
so, how did we achieve the mammoth figures? let’s break down the numbers one by one. $30 billion: to hit the $400 billion target, India had to consistently hit the $30 billion target every month. the numbers stayed above this figure for 11 consecutive months. $39.3 billion: while export targets were set and followed, December 2021 was an outlier. during the 31-day period, India hit its highest-ever monthly merchandise exports of $39.3 billion.>100%: commodities such as petroleum, cereals, cotton, handloom, mica, coal, and plastic exceeded their export target for the financial year. 151%: the growth in the export of petroleum products in the April 2021 to February 2022 period. the value of such exports zoomed to $53.8 billion. $100 billion: the amount of engineering product exports including iron and steel. pent-up demand from markets such as the US helped grow this segment. >$40 billion: the quantum of agricultural exports in the last 12 months. this includes farm products such as grains, cereals, and other agricultural commodities.
