Indian planters urge Thai FTA plan rethink

Mint reports

Fears of concessional import of natural rubber from Thailand under the proposed free trade agreement (FTA) has caused a flutter in the rubber sector with growers and traders requesting the Centre to desist from any such move.

United Planters Association of South India (Upasi) president J.K. Thomas has, in a representation to the government, requested it to reconsider the move to allow cheap import of rubber from Thailand.

Thomas said he feared that the agreement would mean delisting rubber from the sensitive list which would bring down the present import tariff from 20% to 5%.
Indian Rubber Dealers’ Federation vice-president N. Radhakrishnan noted that Thailand is the largest natural rubber producer with an annual production of around 32 lakh tonnes. Both groups claim that the move would seriously affect the livelihood of small and marginal growers who account for 90% of the more than one million growers producing 8.03 lakh tonne of rubber annually.

Tyre manufacturers seek ban on rubber futures

BS reports

Stating that rubber futures are not helping in "price discovery" and "risk management", tyre manufacturers have demanded a ban on forward trading of the commodity.

In a letter to the Commerce, Industry and Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion Secretaries, the Automotive Tyre Manufactuers Association (ATMA) has said the demand for ban on rubber futures is no different from the bar imposed by the Centre on forward trading in urad, tur, rice and wheat. The New Delhi-based ATMA is the apex body of tyre makers in the country.

"The steep increase in the price of rubber has imposed severe financial burden on the tyre industry. Further, since rubber is the prime raw material for the production of items such as chappals, battery boxes, condom, hoses and thousands of other items, the steep price increase has forced hundreds of manufacturers to close shutters and most others are at the verge of closure or facing a difficult time due to exorbitant increase in input costs," ATMA said in the letter.