Commerce Ministry plans Mobile Apps for Benefit of Stakeholders

The Commerce Ministry is pressing ahead with its efforts to build mobile applications which will offer all stakeholders, including exporters and importers, all the relevant information and notifications on their smart phones.

The ministry has set up a committee to decide on types of apps to be developed for each organisation in the ministry, sources said.

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Private players will develop apps separately for the Directorate General of Foreign Trade (DGFT), the Directorate General of Supplies and Disposal (DGS&D), special economic zones (SEZs), Tea Board, Coffee Board and Spices Board.

Export promotion councils that receive funds from Market Access Initiative (MAI), an export promotion scheme of the commerce ministry, have also been asked to develop similar mobile apps.

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The Department of Electronics and Information Technology has dashed off a letter to the ministry regarding the development of user-friendly mobile apps, which can be freely downloaded by the stakeholders for use in mobile communication instruments.

The move is also part of the steps the government is taking to improve India's ranking in ease of doing business index here. The government had announced an umbrella programme 'Digital India' comprising various projects worth about Rs 1 lakh crore to transform the country into a digitally empowered knowledge economy.

The programme includes projects that aim to ensure government services are available to citizens electronically and people get benefit of the latest information and communication technology.

The vision of the government under the Digital India project includes creation of ICT infrastructure like high-speed Internet at gram panchayat level and on-demand availability of government services like health and education.

Source: PTI