THE consumer durables sector is set to close the current financial year with 12% growth, 0.5 percentage point more than the growth registered last fiscal, according to a Ficci survey. The survey is based on feedback from the consumer durables industry, allied industry organisations and government agencies. Technological improvements, falling prices due to competition, aggressive and innovative marketing and declining import tariffs have contributed to the strong growth. The survey has projected that the market for non-IT consumer durable goods, estimated at Rs 35,000 crore in 2006-07, is expected to achieve 12% growth in the current year. According to the survey, many high-end products such as LCD TV, MP3, DVD, split air-conditioner, high end washing machine do not find place in the list of items covered by the Central Statistical Organisation (CSO) for calculating official data. These items, however, have seen impressive growth. The sectors which are projected to achieve ‘excellent’ growth rates of more than 20% in terms of units manufactured are air-conditioner (25%), split air-conditioner (60%), frost-free refrigerator (54%), washing machines (20 %), fully-automatic washing machine (35 %), microwave oven (35 %), high-end flat panel TV (100 %) and DVD (25 %). The sectors which are expected to record high growth rates between 10% and 20 % are refrigerator (11 %) and colour TV (15 %).