Brand India label for quality domestic steel products soon
1 min read . Updated: 11 Apr 2023, 11:11 PM IST
PremiumAs per steel ministry’s estimates, by 2030-31, the operational capacity of crude steel production of SAIL will rise from existing 19.51 million tonnes per annum to around 35.65 MTPA.
New Delhi: The government plans to boost the reputation of Indian-made products by introducing a ‘Brand India’ label for steel products that will be manufactured under strict quality control.
Steel minister Jyotiraditya Scindia said these products will set new benchmarks for credibility and quality and strengthen domestic manufacturing in line with the Atmanirbhar Bharat initiative.
Only products made to the standards of 13 sector-specific metrics formulated by the government and industry would get the Brand India label.
These metrics cover the production process, location, product design and quality standards for steel products.
“Since August 2022, the ministry of steel, in collaboration with the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) and QCI (Quality Council of India) has been working on a framework to showcase the strength of the Indian steel industry by leveraging the ‘Made in India’ label on steel products in both domestic and export markets. As part of this effort, stakeholder consultations were conducted with leading Indian steel plants to draw a consensus on the scheme criteria and QR code components for steel manufacturers," Scindia said.
He said state-owned SAIL and private sector producer Jindal Stainless Ltd will soon initiate a pilot to manufacture these world-class steel products.
Once the pilot is complete, the government proposes to rope in all local steel manufacturers to join the initiative and start promoting Brand India steel both in domestic and global markets.
“The ministry of steel has invited other Indian steel plants to participate in branding their steel products under the ‘Made in India’ label scheme. QCI is facilitating the smooth onboarding of these steel plants," the steel minister said.
In order to integrate the technology platforms of SAIL and JSL with the ‘Made in India’ label, the QCI team visited the JSL Hisar plant and the Bokaro plant of SAIL. Both SAIL and JSL have now been successfully integrated with the Made in India platform. Apart from branding the steel industry, the ministry of steel is also engaging with stakeholders from the steel industry and the government departments and ministries—such as environment, forests and climate change, power, Bureau of Energy Efficiency, new and renewable energy, and NITI Aayog—to work out a strategy to decarbonize Indian steel.
In line with India’s global commitments, Scindia said 13 key components have been identified as levers for the low carbon transition of the steel sector.
A task force has been constituted with the involvement of experts and industry to discuss, deliberate and brainstorm over each of the components and to come up with actionable points.
Scindia said that after the success of the PLI scheme for specialized steel, where MoUs for 57 applications from 27 companies were signed on 17 March, a new PLI 2.0 is being considered by the steel ministry. This may be launched after consultation with stakeholders to finalize the products and categories to be covered under the scheme.
The government is looking to strengthen the steel sector in order to boost production that will be required to meet rapidly growing domestic demand and facilitate infrastructure development. As per steel ministry’s estimates, by 2030-31, the operational capacity of crude steel production of SAIL will rise from existing 19.51 million tonnes per annum to around 35.65 MTPA.
SAIL has already achieved an all-time best annual production in FY 2022-23 of 19.4 million tonnes of hot metal and 18.2 MT crude steel.