Spices are highly linked with the history of civilization, exploration and commerce of India. India is known as the ‘land of spices’ because of its position as the largest producer and exporter of spices in the world. According to Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS), about 63 spices are being grown in our country. The estimated trade in spices from India for 2011–2012 was 5, 75, 270 metric tonnes valued at Rs.9, 783.42 crore ($2037.76 million). Nominal Protection Coefficient (NPC) was employed to assess the export competitiveness of cumin in the world market for the period from 2001 to 2012. Cumin production showed a significant positive growth rate of 9.31 per cent per annum and quantity of cumin exported from India showed a very high positive and signifi cant growth rate of 22.28 per cent per annum with wide fluctuations during the study period. Our empirical results showed that, out of the ten major importing countries, cumin was found to be non-competitive for Nepal and Malaysia during the study period and not a single country was found to be highly competitive during this period. Cumin export was found to be non-competitive during the years 2002, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2010 and 2012 to all the importing countries.
