Chinese government regulates the entire gold jewellery industry through the Shanghai Gold Exchange
Representational Picture
Mumbai: After losing the number one position as the world’s largest consumers of gold to China in 2013, India could also loose out in gold jewellery manufacturing to China as Asia’s largest economy has embarked on major policy reforms to make it an important gold manufacturing and trading centre in the world.
“Markets are abuzz with the possibility of India’s jewellery manufacturers shifting their bases to China as they have managed to put in place strong institutional mechanisms to enable trading and manufacturing of gold. If India continues to constrain the industry with import curbs and does not invest in skill development and build institutional mechanisms as China did, we could slowly loose our manufacturing base to China,” said P.R.Somasundaram, managing director, World Gold Council.
While 60 per cent of the gold jewellery market in India remains unregulated, the Chinese government regulates the entire gold jewellery industry through the Shanghai Gold Exchange (SGE). There are over five lakh gold retail jewellers in India as compared to one lakh jewellers in China. The SGE now plans to launch an international board or trading platform in the newly established Shanghai Free Trade Zone.
This will provide a platform for overseas investors to trade its products and for launch of new products. He said that the Chinese were also able to establish an organised supply chain system. “The annual production of gold from Chinese gold mines now stands at 437 tonnes. Three decades back, it was just 10 tonnes.” In comparison India’s annual gold production has remained stagnant at 1.5-2 tonne.
( Source : dc corerespondent )
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