by our special correspondent:Even though the central government shoot up a second letter to start exim trade in all ports along with Petrapole the local administration are holding up the multi crore trade at the biggest landport of the country.
According to the local exporters the central government is repeatedly sending circulars to speed up the trade through Petrapole. But till now , as per local sources, nearly 2000 trucks are stranding with goods at Petrapole. While the exporters, transporters are at loss due to non delivery of the goods other stake holders too are loosing their job. One of the clearing agent said ” Our income has been reduced to zero as we mostly work on commission basis.We get a fraction of the monetary volume of goods that is exchanged between the countries. But as customs is not working we are not getting our dues. ” nearly 2500 clearing agent works in Petrapole border. Trade worth several crores are being ruined everyday in this biggest landport of the country.
One of the major reason of hauling up the trade is negative attitude of the local administration of Bongaon. A trade insider said that the sub-divisional and local civic administration fearing that the drivers and helpers who will be going to Bangladesh and coming back may become a source of corona intrusion. Interestingly neither central government nor the state government could set up a permanent suspect testing facility in one month of lock down to ease the trade between both the country.The integrated check post maintained by the landport authority hardly taken any proper initiative in this matter.
In order to make the economy move economists are of opinion that the production units should be allowed to work with minimum labour to complete the pending orders, else many of the units may see irreparable losses in the coming days added trade lobby. On Wednesday, the World Trade Organisation (WTO) said that global trade is likely to deteriorate by 13 per cent to 31 per cent in 2020 due to coronavirus pandemic. FIEO also asked the government to give exports a waiver from paying into Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) and Employees’ State Insurance Corporation (ESIC) funds for 3 months, from March to May.
Meanwhile, the economy is expected to lose nearly $100 billion during the 21-day lockdown due to coronavirus, Business ratings said in a report. Each day of the shutdown may cost the economy more than $4.5 billion, the report added. In the last week of March, Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced a three-week complete lockdown of the country until April 14 to prevent the spread of coronavirus. Q1FY21 GDP is expected to see a risk of contraction to the tune of 5 per cent to 6 per cent with Q2 also likely to record a muted growth, the rating agency also said.
Meanwhile world trade body is of opinion that U.S. trade would decline almost $1 trillion in 2019 if it falls at the same rate it did in 2009, when the global economy was reeling from the crisis that originated with the U.S. mortgage market.The coronavirus pandemic now sweeping the world is the third major jolt to the global economy in the first two decades of this century. And while it might appear to be the most vexing at the moment, it is certainly way too early to know, or to know the impact on trade specifically.
It’s almost certainly true that the global supply chain is more resilient and nimble than it was a decade ago — and certainly two decades ago, when we experienced the first jolt to the global economy, the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist strike on New York City and Washington, D.C.
But in the same way that it is difficult to project the depth and breadth of this strain of coronavirus relative to two previous strains, SARS and MERS, so to is it difficult to compare this jolt to the global supply chain and export-import trade to the two earlier crises. So in backdrop of world crisis little initiative on both side of the border at Petrapole can easily solve the livelihood of at least several thousand people .
