India’s total exports for April-September 2024 are estimated at US$ 393.2 billion, reflecting a positive growth of 4.9% YoY. Exports have shown growth in key segments including engineering goods, electronics, chemicals, drugs and pharma, plastics and readymade garments.
India’s exports continue to be impacted by the slowing global growth, along with the rising geopolitical tensions (in West Asia and Ukraine), disruptions in Red Sea trade routes, and fluctuating oil prices. All of these could pose challenges by reducing exports and significantly increasing import costs, as oil imports remain largely inelastic. The World Trade Organization (WTO) had last week lowered its global trade growth forecast for 2025 to 3% from 3.3%, while slightly raising the 2024 estimate to 2.7% from the previous 2.6%. It also highlighted that geopolitical tensions and policy uncertainty, particularly driven by the West Asia crisis, could jeopardize these forecasts.
Despite these challenges, India’s overall exports, comprising both merchandise and services, experienced an increase of 4.9% YoY in the first half of FY25, reaching US$ 393.22 billion for the April-September period, according to the Ministry of Commerce & Industry. Total imports for the first half of FY25 amounted to US$ 448.1 billion, an increase by 6.9% YoY.
Merchandise exports rose marginally from US$ 211.08 billion in April-September 2023 to US$ 213.22 billion the first half of FY25, while service exports increased from US$ 163.92 billion to US$ 180 billion. Services exports is estimated to grow by 9.81% during April-September 2024 over April-September 2023.
However, despite this growth, the trade deficit expanded significantly by 24.11% to reach US$ 54.8 billion during April-September, 2024-25.
As per the data, Non-petroleum and non-gems & jewellery exports in April-September 2024 were at US$ 162.8 billion, compared to US$ 153.7 billion in April-September 2023. On the other hand, non-petroleum, non-gems & jewellery (gold, silver & precious metals) imports stood at US$ 222.7 billion, compared to US$ 211.3 billion in April-September 2023.
Engineering goods continued to be the largest export category, valued at US$ 56.24 billion, followed by petroleum products at US$ 36.56 billion. Exports of electronic goods reached US$ 15.64 billion, while drugs and pharmaceuticals amounted to US$ 14.43 billion, and organic and inorganic chemicals totaled US$ 14.11 billion.
Fastest growing export commodities during Apr-Sep 2024
Source: Ministry of Commerce & Industry, figures in brackets indicate YoY growth rates
The major export destinations, in terms of YoY growth during the period included Netherland (36.7%), USA (5.6%), UAE (11.5%), Malaysia (27.9%) and the UK (12.4%). Correspondingly, the fast growing source countries for India’s imports included UAE (52%), China (11.5%), Russia (5.7%), Taiwan (40%) and Oman (51.5%).
India’s merchandise export growth of 5.3% surpassed the global average of 0.1%. Additionally, gold imports surged, doubling from US$ 4.94 billion last year to US$ 10.06 billion this year. This growth is attributed to seasonal demand linked to Indian festivals.
Commerce Secretary Sunil Barthwal said, “In merchandise exports India is doing much better than the global average and the rest of the world. There has been growth in shipment of all import export products like engineering goods, electronics, chemicals, drugs and pharma, plastics and readymade garments.”
