Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Saturday made a slew of announcements about manufacturing, export promotion and transport as she began presenting the Budget 2025-’26 in Parliament.

Sitharaman announced a National Manufacturing Mission that will encompass small, medium and large industries. The mission will seek to provide policy support and execution roadmaps for Union ministries as well as state governments.

Sitharaman announced that an Export Promotion Mission will be set up to support micro, small and medium enterprises to “tackle non-tariff measures in overseas markets”. Facilitation groups will be set up to promote the export of select products and to improve supply chains.

The finance minister also announced that a modified UDAN scheme will be launched to enhance regional connectivity to 120 new destinations and carry four crore passengers in the next 10 years. Further, each infrastructure-related ministry will be asked to come up with a three-year pipeline of public-private partnership infrastructure projects.

On tourism, Sitharaman announced that the top 50 tourist destinations in the country will be developed in partnership with states “through a challenge mode”. States will be given performance-linked incentives for effective destination managements, she said.

The finance minister announced that a new “fund of funds” for startups worth Rs 10,000 crore will be set up.

The government also announced a new scheme to benefit five lakh women entrepreneurs and entrepreneurs among Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes.

8% growth needed, says Economic Survey

The Economic Survey 2024-’25, which was tabled on Friday, said India will need to achieve sustained economic growth of close to 8% for at least a decade to achieve its goal of becoming a developed country by 2047.

The survey’s prediction for economic growth in 2025-’26 falls short of this target, with the country’s real gross domestic product expected to grow between 6.3% and 6.8% in the upcoming financial year.

The Reserve Bank of India had said on December 30 that India’s economy was demonstrating resilience and stability, and projected GDP growth at 6.6% in 2024-’25. The central bank said that the growth was aided by a revival in rural consumption, among other factors.

The government had in the interim budget proposed to raise the capital expenditure for the financial year 2024-’25 by 11.1% to Rs 11.11 lakh crore.