What is this DTR all about?
In India, Trade Statistics are obtained as a by-product of administrative activity. In the case of External Trade, there are three stages of administrative activity namely, licensing, actual shipment and arrival of goods, and the receipt and remittance of payments. The Director General of Foreign Trade (DGFT) is responsible for licensing statistics; the Director General of Commercial Intelligence and Statistics (DGCI&S) for the balance of trade statistics and the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) for the balance of payment statistics. The merchandise trade statistics disseminated by the DGCI&S captures the movement of goods across the customs frontier of the country and are based on the Daily Trade Return (DTR) generated at the various custom houses.
The main sources for India's Foreign Trade Statistics are Shipping Bills and Bills of Entry – declarations made and submitted by exporters and importers, respectively to the authorities of customs at the ports. These bills are statutory documents, which contain the customs' permission to ship or land the goods, as the case may be. These Shipping Bills and Bills of Entries for each item of export and import contain relevant details of the transactions such as Code Number of the Commodity according to Indian Trade Classification based on Harmonised Commodity Description and Coding System {ITC(HS)}, description of the commodity, license particulars of the goods in the case of imports, value of exports or imports, quantity (gross and net), amount of duty, name of exporter or importer, country of destination or consignment, Importer and Exporter Code (IEC), etc. These particulars are transcribed into a return – called Daily Trade Return (DTR) by the Statistical Division of the customs authorities and are subsequently forwarded to the Directorate General of Commercial Intelligence and Statistics (DGCI&S), which is the nodal agency for collection, compilation, publication and dissemination of Foreign Trade Statistics of India.
How relevant or useful is this data?
In a Project Report for the Planning Commission - An Analysis of Customs House and Company Data, the Institute for Studies in Industrial Development mentioned that the name Godrej & Boyce Mfg Co Pvt Ltd appeared in 587 different ways in the original DTRs and even a simpler name like Mazagon Dock Ltd was entered in 168 ways. In the Computation, Godrej will be taken as 587 different importers and Mazagon Dock as 168.