MoPSW hosts Workshop on Revitalizing Indian Ship Building Industry

The event brought together key stakeholders, representatives from various government ministries, departments, shipping operators and PSU/ private sector shipyards to discuss strategies for revitalizing the shipbuilding and repair ecosystem within India and aligning it with India’s ambitious Maritime India Vision 2030 (MIV 2030) and Amrit Kaal Vision 2047.

‘’Under the leadership of Hon’ble Prime Minister, India is set to become a global economic superpower, with a robust maritime sector playing a crucial role in this journey. Atma Nirbharta emphasize self-reliance, extending to the shipping and shipbuilding industries. Despite efforts and developments in port infrastructure and inland waterways, we remain dependent on foreign vessels and have yet to capture a significant share of the global shipbuilding market. Recognizing this, the Ministry is now focusing on enhancing our shipbuilding, and ship repair infrastructure to meet the ambitious goals of MIV 2030 and MAKV 2047. Through this interactive workshop, MoPSW aims to present specific policies based on stakeholder inputs and invite further valuable contributions to drive demand and capacity growth in these sectors’, Shri TK Ramachandran, Secretary of MoPSW. The presentation made by the Ministry highlighted the growing trend of the Indian overseas and coastal cargo, while at the same time highlighting that the share of the cargo carried by Indian owned/ flagged vessels has been dropping over the past decade and presently stand at only about 5.4%. If there is no initiative undertaken, then this share may fall further, resulting in Indian owned/ Indian built ships having no play even in India’s own shipping market.

Furthermore, owning of the fleet needed for national trade brings with it several key advantages in terms of availability of fleet in times of crisis, protection against embargos and protection of India’s valuable foreign exchange reserves which is presently being spent on chartering and freight management charges to foreign nations.

At the same, time, if the tremendous demand stemming from the needs of the Indian shipping market are adequately targeted by Indian shipyards, it may result in an opportunity to the extent of over USD 237 billion (~INR 20 lakh crores) by 2047.