to manufacture space delay in buying land and approvals drives away investors china and many other countries have hundreds of operation ready industrial zones each zone takes necessary permissions for all future units for example a chemical zone will take approvals for effluent discharge and quality the investor will agree to follow these once ready the investor moves in installs machinery and starts production in a few weeksmonths industrial corridors being developed across 32 places in india under the national master plan may adopt this modelsix ensure quick factory to ship movement slow factory to ship movement hinders india from becoming a part of the production supply chain we can reduce the time taken in transporting goods from factory to port through dedicated freight corridors locating industrial zones near the sea is another option port and customs procedures must be done in the industrial zone to avoid crowding at the port and ensuring just in time arrivalsseven review the import duty structure this is also the key to signing happy ftas our 90 of imports by value take place in less than 10 product tariff lines we must test the impact of lowering of import duty on the production and export ecosystem of remaining products for example most electronic products are assemblies of thousands of components manufactured across many countries components combine into subassemblies and then into the finished product a part crosses country borders many times in such a scenario even a modest duty on components has a multiplier effect for this reason most countries charge no import duty on parts or electronics productseight ensure predictability reduce arbitrariness in policy regime avoid backdated policy changes reduce scope for interpretation in tax laws by use of clear unambiguous language for example both india and nokia interpreted the royalty provisions of the double tax avoidance treaty in different ways a few years back when nokia shut its india operations annual mobile phone exports from india fell from 2 billion to zero 10000 direct jobs were lost india and nokias loss was chinas gainnine set up systems for quick resolution of disputes firms enter into contracts with other firms and individuals for the supply of goods and services in case of dispute parties approach the court for enforcing the contract long delays at the indian courts compromise indias attractiveness quick improvement is a must for improving investor confidencenurturing an investment is like growing a crop smart global firms are the quality seeds that grow in a supportive environment returns for such an approach are high samsung started small in vietnam 10 years back but lured by good experience expanded its operations to export more than 50 billion of products now its success also pulled others the ninestep framework will enhance indias appeal as a credible manufacturing and investment destinationthe writer is an indian trade service officer views are personal toi contributor published on dec 2 2020 at 1107 am ist telegram facebook copy link be the first one to comment comment now