Date: 01/10/2022 Shift: 2:00 PM – 4:00 PM Q. No: 191

India’s trucking market is expected to grow over four times by 2050, a Niti Aayog report said on Friday and suggested that financial institutions can work to structure more-favourable financing solutions for zero-emission trucks (ZETs).
The report titled ‘Transforming Trucking in India: Pathways to Zero-Emission Truck Deployment’ further said as road freight travel continues to grow, the number of trucks is expected to more than quadruple, from 4 million in 2022 to roughly 17 million trucks by 2050.
“India’s trucking market is expected to grow over 4x by 2050 — fuelling the nation’s economy and transportation emissions,” it said.
Pointing out that road transport (i.e. trucks) carries the bulk of India’s goods, 70 per cent of today’s domestic freight demand, the report said heavy and medium-duty trucks (HDTs and MDTs) are responsible for most of that road transportation.
According to the report, currently, India transports 4.6 billion tonnes of freight annually, generating a transport demand of 2.2 trillion tonne-kilometres (tonne-km) at the cost of Rs 9.5 lakh crore.
Noting that demand for goods is rising with urbanization, population increase, the rise of e-commerce and rising income levels, the report said as this demand continues to grow, associated road freight movement is expected to increase to 9.6 trillion tonne-km by 2050.
“In light of these market trends… lenders and other financial institutions can work to structure more-favourable financing for ZET loans through tailored loan products, better-informed depreciation criteria, and alternative credit evaluations,” it suggested.
Zero-emissions trucks (ZETs) — including battery electric trucks (BETs) and fuel cell electric trucks (FCETs) — do not have tailpipe emissions and have lower operating costs.