India's imports of sensitive items up at Rs31,692 crore in April-July 2011

India's imports of items included in the sensitive list rose 37.6 per cent year-on-year to Rs31,692 crore during April-July 2011, compared to Rs23,039 crore during the corresponding period of the previous year.

This compares to a 36.18 per cent increase in overall (all commodities) imports into the country, at Rs674,324 crore during April-July 2011, from Rs495,149 crore during the same period last year.

Import of sensitive items constitutes 4.7 per cent of the gross imports, both during the current year and during the previous year. 

While imports of milk and milk products, tea and coffee and food grains have declined at broad group level during the period, imports of all other items, viz edible oil, automobiles, fruits and vegetables (including nuts), pulses, rubber, cotton and silk, products of SSI, spices, marble and granite and alcoholic beverages have increased during the April-July 2011 period, official data showed.

Imports of edible oils, another import-sensitive item, has increased from Rs8763.7 crore last year to Rs14,273.6 crore in the corresponding period of this year. Imports of both crude oil as well as refined oil have gone up by 62.4 per cent and 67.3 per cent, respectively. The increase in edible oil imports has been mainly due to substantial increase in import of crude palm oil and its fractions.

Imports of sensitive items from countries such as Indonesia, China, Malaysia, Argentina, Germany, South Korea, Ukraine, United States, Canada, Japan, Thailand, Benin, Ghana, United Kingdom etc have gone up while those from Myanmar, Australia etc have gone down.