The Centre is working on reducing tariff barriers on a limited range of items in its trade negotiations with the UK and Australia as the first step towards a broader free trade agreement — called an early harvest deal — and is at present exploring the possibilities of a greater market access in the US.
“The trade talk with the UK is progressing well. Teams are talking to each other, scoping is being done, line ministries are identifying areas in which we can quickly close the deal, in terms of early harvest, if possible,” commerce and industry minister Piyush Goyal said here on Thursday.
“Instead of trying to address 11,000 (tariff) lines, if we can look at their and our areas of interest and close an early harvest agreement and (then) negotiate on the rest of the agreement,” the minister told representatives of export promotion organisations.
Australia has also shown the “highest level of engagement” and significant interest to do an early harvest agreement.
The minister said India is at a “positive momentum” with respect to inking FTAs with the European Union (EU), UK, Australia, Canada, Bangladesh, the UAE and the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) nations as well as Israel.
“The US as of now has kind of indicated that they are not looking for new trade agreements, but we look at working with them for more market access issues on both sides and I think that would also be a big relief and a big opportunity opener for our export sector,” Goyal said.
He said the Modi government had been more pro-active then its predecessors in seeking the views of the domestic stakeholders. “We are engaging with all of you and industry to ensure that FTAs are fairly and equitably crafted, bringing in more elements of reciprocity. ”
He said an FTA cannot be a “one way traffic” and the country must open up its markets if the exporters want a larger market share overseas. “My appeal and request to all is to also identify areas where we have the confidence that we can withstand competition.”
He urged the export promotion councils to study FTAs and see whether there are “hidden” opportunities in them as it will help India to set significantly higher export targets for 2022-23.
