Special Economic Zones in India ― Status, Issues and Potential

This book examines India’s ten years of experience developing Special Economic Zones (SEZs) and the performance of SEZs in the context of India’s growing international engagement, its endeavours to attract domestic and foreign investment in manufacturing and services and its aim to increase and diversify exports of goods and services. SEZs are industrial enclaves/clusters within a country that receive certain incentives and business facilitation benefits that are not generally available to the rest of the country. To facilitate private and foreign investment in SEZs, India introduced the SEZ policy in 2000, which was followed by the SEZ Act in 2005. After ten years under the Act, India now has one of the largest number of approved SEZs in the world and its SEZ policy remains heatedly debated, with a number of studies arguing both for and against it. Given this background, the book also identifies the challenges faced by SEZs in India and offers policy recommendations on how to make the SEZs an engine for India’s economic growth and development that can more effectively link the country’s manufacturing and services sectors to global value chains.

Dr. Arpita Mukherjee is a Professor at Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations (ICRIER). She has several years of experience in policy-oriented research, working closely with the government in India and policymakers in the EU, US, ASEAN and in East Asian countries. She has conducted studies for various international organizations and Indian industry associations. Her research is a key contributor to India’s negotiating strategies in the WTO and bilateral agreements. She has authored chapters in joint study group reports set up by Indian government and has led research teams contributing to India’s domestic policy reforms in areas such as logistics, retail and special economic zones. Her research interest includes trade and domestic reforms; WTO; bilateral/regional agreements; retail; infrastructure; FDI; special economic zones; economic corridors and production networks; and migration. Dr Mukherjee has a Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Portsmouth, UK. She has published widely and presented her research in various international and national forums.

Dr. Parthapratim Pal is a Professor at the Indian Institute of Management (IIM) Calcutta. He has a Masters, MPhil and Ph.D. in Economics from the Center for Economic Studies and Planning of the Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. Before joining IIM, he worked with the Indian Council for Research in International Economic Relations (ICRIER), Economic Research foundation (ERF) and the Indian Institute of Foreign Trade (IIFT). He has done a number of consultancy and research works for the Ministry of Commerce, Ministry of Agriculture, United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), WTO, UNCTAD and British High Commission. His recent areas of interest include international trade, regional trade agreements, WTO related issues and international capital flows. He has a number of publications in nationally and internationally reputed journals and books.

Subhobrota Ray is an economist and an independent consultant. Currently she is working on projects with ICRIER and CII. She has several years of research and project management experience with premier chambers of commerce (CII and Indian Chamber of Commerce) and economic research institutes (ICRIER). She has been involved in industry related research spanning a wide spectrum of sectors. She is a university rank holder with post-graduation in Economics from Presidency College, Calcutta University, and has been awarded a First Prize - Presidential Award (1996) for a paper on “Vision of South Asia and How That Vision Should Be Realised” among participants from SAARC countries.

Tanu M Goyal is a Consultant at ICRIER. Her research interests include trade in services, foreign direct investment issues and retail. She has several years of research experience and has worked on projects for the Government of India, Asian Development Bank (ADB), European Commission (EC), among others. She has done an evaluation study for a cluster development scheme of the Indian Government and has field experience and knowledge of Government's policies on the topic. She has published several international and national journal articles, book chapters, reports and other popular media articles on policy and trade issues. She has a Masters degree in Economics with specialisation in world economy, from Centre of Trade and Development (CITD), Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi.