Agro-Chemicals Body Asks For Tax Sops On Research Expenditure

New Delhi:

CropLife India, an industry body of 16 agro-chemical companies, has demanded that the government should provide tax sops in the upcoming budget on expenditures incurred for research and development (R&D).

CropLife India urged the government to “retain a uniform basic customs duty of 10 per cent for both technical raw materials and for formulations”.

The association also demanded that the government should provide a 200 per cent weighted deduction on R&D expenses by agrochemical companies.

Durgesh Chandra, Secretary General, CropLife India, said, “In order to enhance the income of the farmers, agriculture reforms are the need of the hour and Budget 2023-24 will be an imminent step”.

He suggested a 50 per cent subsidy on local procurement and maintenance costs of drones and their batteries/components.

“This will help in the growth of the domestic drone sector and usher in faster uptake of this new and revolutionary technology,” the association said.

CropLife India is an association of 16 R&D-driven member companies in crop protection. It jointly represents around 70 per cent of the market and is responsible for 95 per cent of the molecules introduced in the country. The association’s member companies have an annual global R&D spend of USD 6 billion.

MK Dhanuka, Managing Director, Dhanuka Agritech, said: “We expect that the government will take a view on reducing the customs duty on import of Pesticides. This move will enable our farmers to buy pesticides at reasonable prices”.

KC Ravi, Chief Sustainability Officer, Syngenta India Pvt Ltd, said the input cost in the farm sector has risen.

“An enhanced outlay for PM-KISAN will also ensure farmers get more liquidity to buy inputs,” he added.

KC Ravi said the industry is also expecting the government to devise a special Production Linked Incentives (PLI) scheme for the agrochemical sector, which will have a spiralling effect on boosting manufacturing in India, he added.

“The upcoming budget should look forward to allocating funds to research and development activities to develop new more effective and safer solutions for the control of pests, diseases and weeds for chemical as well as biological streams. Different forms of incentive to the companies engaged in such R&D activities can be a motivating factor for them to invest more in the same,” said Rajesh Aggarwal, Managing Director, Insecticides India.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)