India and the European Union (EU) now aim for a complete free trade agreement (ALE) rather than a provisional agreement, and works against a tight period to conclude it.
Declaring that the plan is to sign a “large -scale ALE”, an official declared that a lot of progress had been made in negotiations and that only a few loose ends must be attached. “The situation remains dynamic,” he added.
On Tuesday, the French foreign trade minister Laurent Saint-Martin said here that he was “quite optimistic about the fact that we can have an agreement in the coming weeks, of the coming months”.
He stressed that the agreement is “because we must present to the world that we believe in trade, in the freer trade and not in a trade war”. “This is what we agreed,” said the French minister after a bilateral meeting with Indian trade and the Minister of Industry Piyush Goyal. “India is one of our priorities and I know that the European Commission really wants to accelerate (ALE),” he added.
In February, India and the EU set a deadline for the end of the year for the conclusion of negotiations and an overview of the agreement.
India-EU has 23 chapters and all except one or two on the outskirts of the trade can be carried away, said the above official.
EU regulations concerning carbon emissions – carbon border adjustment mechanism (CBAM) and deforestation regulations (DR) – which will have a direct impact on trade are also discussed by both sides.
The key chapters dealing with basic commercial problems in India -EU of the ALE – negotiations for which have trade in goods and services, rules of origin, customs, technical obstacles to trade, commercial appeals and dispute resolution.
The agreement must also cover areas such as government purchases, intellectual property, competition, mergers control and subsidies, transparency and regulatory good practices and sustainable food systems.
In addition to the ALE, a bilateral investment treaty (ILO) and an agreement on geographic indications (GI) are under discussion by both parties. The conclusion of the ALE will precede the two other agreements, added the manager.
The French Minister of Foreign Trade, Laurent Saint -Martin, said that France wanted to reduce obstacles – pricing and non -tariff barriers while taking care of its sensitivities in agriculture, the environment and health standards. “At the end, each agreement is a consensus. Therefore, each party must understand the concerns and sensitive problems of each party. ”
The French Minister said that trade between India and France of $ 15 billion is lower than potential and has recommended increasing collaboration and business investments between the two countries.
“So we can do more. This is true in terms of export. It is also true in terms of cross-investment and co-investment. I believe in joint ventures that can be in India or France which must be accelerated,” he added.
The key requested from EU India in its negotiations is zero prices on exports with high intensity of labor and better access to the group services of the group of 27 members. The EU pushes India to reduce prices on cheese and skimmed powdered milk, which India is currently protecting high tasks to protect its domestic dairy industry. Indian officials say they wouldn’t want to provide concessions in dairy products in one of the FTAs. Even in the United Kingdom, the EFT, dairy products were kept away.
European winegrowers are pushing better access to the Indian market, where imported wines are currently faced at a rate of 150%. The EU wants India to considerably eliminate or reduces these tasks to 30 to 40%. India can like to correspond to what it has offered to Australia under ECTA, where Australian wines have been reduced to 50% in 10 years.
European car manufacturers want India to reduce import duties to fully built vehicles (CBU) to 10-20%, down compared to current 70%. The EU already exports more than $ 2 billion in automobiles and automotive parts to India each year, most of them arriving in a completely abduction (CKD), which faces a price of 15% when assembled locally.
About The Author
