ON IF THE HIGH GROWTH LAST:
Last year's high growth came on the back of 9/11, a global slowdown and a strong rupee. Clearly, competitiveness is building up among exporters and Indian industry is acclimatizing to the changed global environment. In fact, export growth of countries like Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia the US had a negative growth rate in exports between April and December 2002. Barring China, whose exports rose by 26 per cent, even Asian Tigers had lower growth rate than India (20 per cent) during the period.

ON HIS POLICY'S FOCUS:
Gone are the days when Exim policy would regulate items for import and export. We need to think bigger-- we are looking at $80 billion export target by 2006-7. This is the first services exports have been brought into the policy. There are many engines of growth in services like health and entertainment. In the past Indians traveled overseas for bypass surgery. Today people come from abroad for operations in India. Hospitals like Apollo and Escorts earn at least 10 percent of their income in foreign exchange. Why can't we treat hospitals as EOUs and locate in the SEZs. That's what finance minister Jaswant Singh meant when he said he wants to make Indian the global health destination.

ON IMPACT OF IRAQ WAR:
Right now one can only guess. If the war stretches for long our exports to the Gulf region--11 per cent of total exports---may get affected. A lower demand in big markets like the US will also have its fall out. But if the war is not so long and India gets a decent share of Iraq rebuilding we will be better off. The end of war is also likely to reduce oil prices by 7-8 per cent which could boost economy and therefore exports.

ON LABOUR REFORMS:
Some political parties are shouting about an imaginary import surge. Firstly, there is no such surge. Secondly if we want to fight exports of other countries we much provide Indian exporter same environment as other countries do. Labour laws are important in this context. We shouldn't obstruct labour law reforms for export sector.

ON INFRASTRUCTURE INEFFCIENCIES:
Right now transaction costs of exports are very high--about 14 per cent of the total cost. The expansion of Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) will make sea port related transactions faster and less costly.

ON THRUST ON AGRI EXPORT:
In agriculture, corporate investments is a must. We have right now three examples of Pepsi, Nestle in the dairy sector and ITC's e-choupals. But we need to encourage corporate investment through fiscal incentives - and plenty more will come up.

ON IMPORTS AND DRAGON THREAT:
Look at the big picture. During April-February export stood at $46.07 billion and import at $53.87 billion. Oil imports alone stood at $15.94 billion while non-oil at $37.93 billion. And non-oil non-gold imports stood at $34.18 billion. The argument of import surge is baseless. Even perception of Chinese imports flooding Indian market is wrong.
Exports to China have grown by 86 per cent (April-December) while imports grew by only 38 per cent. The trade gap between the two country is narrowing.

ON THE SLUMP IN TOURISM:
Our hotels offer competitive service but we have made them expensive by imposing so many taxes after taxes. And destroying tourism.. So first you give them free land of Rs 50 crore and then you tell them there will be taxes. But who will pay a $300 tariff. So bring the tariff down by lowering the taxes. The states are also cooperating. Every top hotel - 50% of their earning is forex and we don't give them a damn because this is only meant for merchandise, gems and jewelry. There is such a huge potential in services sector.

ON MISSING REFERENCE TO WTO:
In WTO crucial issues related to agriculture which does not come here barring agriculture exports. We are very aggressive on export of services. We also know that pharma has to be given a big boost in the post TRIPs era. There is uncertainty on textiles but we can not ignore it just because of labour reform problems.