New Delhi, Aug. 25 -- Acknowledging that India has high tariffs, a Confederation of Indian Industry's (CII) report has proposed moving from using tariffs as a protection for the domestic industry, to using them to deepen India's integration in the global value chain. This comes as uncertainties loom over the country's exports to its biggest market due to the US tariff policy. The US tariff policy has aggravated the unpredictable nature of global trade, adversely impacting India, a CII report said, proposing 250 actionable recommendations to boost India's competitiveness, including a three-tier tariff structure to integrate itself in global value chains, resolve inverted duty structures and align rates to promote exports. Proposing a three-tier most-favoured nation (MFN) tariff structure, it said raw materials should be kept at 0-2.5% slab, intermediates at 2.5-5%, and final goods at 5-7.5%. "This structure would also boost domestic value addition and attract global manufacturers," said the report on "Policies for a Competitive India" covering 14 critical reform areas. Under the World Trade Organisation (WTO) regime, the MFN rate is non-discriminatory tariff levied by one member on imports from any other member country. The report acknowledged that export is a proven path for economic development. Citing reference to India's $2 trillion exports target by 2030, it said that the policy focus should be on building competitiveness. "For this, there is a need to move from using tariff as a protection for domestic industry, to using tariff to deepen India's integration in the Global Value Chain [GVC], and simultaneously taking measures to boost industry competitiveness," it said. Similar to the $2 trillion export target, the government may consider formulating targets for India's integration in GVCs, through indicators, like share of trade in GDP, share of India in global manufacturing, share of India in global merchandise trade, etc, it said. Elaborating on India's high tariffs -- one of the key reasons for the Trump administration to impose 25% reciprocal tariffs on Indian goods from August 7 and another 25% penalty for purchasing Russian oil from August 27 -- the CII report said India's MFN applied simple average tariff is 39% for agriculture goods and 13.5% for non-agriculture goods. "While the Indian government has made efforts over the years to address concerns related to tariff structure, several challenges remain," it said. "There is a need to move from using tariff as a protection for domestic industry, to using tariff to deepen India's integration in the Global Value Chain. These include addressing the issue of inverted duty structure, both at MFN and preferential tariff rates, to reduce the number of tariff rates, and to rationalise rates in alignment with export promotion objectives," it added....