NEW DELHI: Addressing the ASSOCHAM India Business Reform Summit 2026, Union Minister of Commerce and Industry Shri Piyush Goyal called for an aggressive, out-of-the-box collaborative approach between the private sector and the government. He urged Indian businesses to leverage ongoing geopolitical risks and West Asian uncertainties as catalysts to build resilient supply chains, drive rapid structural reforms, and boost domestic manufacturing.
Highlighting India’s macro-resilience, Goyal revealed that despite global bottlenecks, high tariffs, and the Ukraine and West Asia conflicts, India’s total exports hit a historic high of USD 863 billion last year, showing growth across both merchandise and services.
The Digital Economy: 100% Tax-Free Cloud Services Until 2047
In a move aimed at establishing India as the undisputed global hub for data management, the Minister announced that cloud services provided internationally from Indian data centers have been granted a 100% tax-free status until 2047.
Goyal emphasized that the rapid setup of hyper-scale data centers would unleash a massive economic ecosystem, boosting ancillary sectors like real estate, power, logistics, and manufacturing.
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The GCC Boom: India is currently home to over 1,800 Global Capability Centres (GCCs), which generate nearly 2 million direct jobs and 10 million indirect jobs, driven by global trust in tech talent.
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Tech Frontiers: The Minister projected exponential growth in the services sector via deep-tech adoption in Artificial Intelligence (AI) and cybersecurity.
One-Stop Industrial Parks & Regulatory Reforms
To streamline the Ease of Doing Business (EoDB), the government is actively working on the Bhavya initiative, which involves extensive stakeholder consultations to set up 100 new industrial parks across the nation, with 20 already under active development.
The Ministry is currently reviewing a proposal to establish a single regulatory body at these industrial parks to act as a unified, one-stop shop for both central and state approvals. Simultaneously, the Commerce Ministry is undergoing internal restructuring, consolidating its sprawling 482 offices across 216 cities into single-point contact centers in state capitals to integrate bodies like the DGFT, GeM, Coffee Board, and Spices Board under a digitally unified umbrella.
Roadmap to a USD 1 Trillion Export Target
Setting the next milestone, the Minister stated that India is aggressively targeting USD 1 trillion in exports. He urged corporate leaders to transition away from exporting cheap raw materials and instead focus on shipping high-value finished goods—such as automobiles, electronics, consumer goods, and agro-processed products.
He also urged exporters to immediately tap into India’s active Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) spanning 38 countries, advising firms to run market trials, launch sampling orders, and establish distribution networks ahead of upcoming treaty implementations. To track this trajectory, Goyal proposed that industry and government jointly deploy performance scorecards monitoring benchmarks in localization, import substitution, energy efficiency, and innovation.
