All ministries to issue quality standard orders: FM

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Saturday said all ministries will issue quality standards orders during the course of this year. The move would help in promoting sale of quality goods in the country and cut import of sub-standard goods.

"In September last year, I had called for a time-bound adoption by industry of all necessary mandatory technical standards and their effective enforcement. All ministries during the course of this year be issuing quality standards orders," she said while presenting the Budget for 2020-21. There is a target to formulate technical regulations for about 5,000 products.

The Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) has been tasked to prepare these regulations. India imports about 11,500 goods per year. The country's top import commodities include crude oil, gold, electronic goods, pulses, fertilisers, machine tools, and pharmaceutical products.

High import bill pushes trade deficit which in turn impacts current account deficit. High imports also affect the country's foreign currency exchange rates.