India-ASEAN free trade agreement most ill-conceived: Piyush Goyal

India’s Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal criticised the previous governments for not doing enough stakeholder consultations on free trade agreements, saying the India-ASEAN FTA was “most ill-conceived” and unfairly favoured imports. Goyal also said India opened its markets to Japan and Korea but has not seen an increase in exports to those countries.

India is planning to establish its own international financing messaging system to assist with the government’s goal of internationalising the Indian currency, according to insiders. An expert committee is exploring options and is aiming to issue findings by August. State Bank of India, Bank of Baroda and Central Bank of India are among the banks […]

India’s decision to ban the export of many varieties of rice has led to fears that food inflation will rise and that countries in the Global South will be most affected due to already high debt levels and inflated food and fuel bills. The ban by the world’s biggest rice exporter has brought chaos to […]

Brussels has insisted that such items should be treated at par with new ones and be eligible for tariff concessions, while New Delhi has concerns it will lead to dumping of e-waste and impact India’s domestic manufacturing.

The signatories of the letter include the National Fishworkers Forum, National Platform for Small Scale Fish Workers, All India Fishers and Fisheries Workers’ Federation, All India Union of Forest Working People, Biswajit Dhar, Distinguished Professor, Council for Social Development, Delhi; Bharat Patel, General Secretary, Machimar Adhikar Sangharsh Samiti (MASS), Gujarat; and Kamala Menon from Delhi […]

Commerce and industry minister Piyush Goyal visited the UK on July 10-11 where he discussed with UK’s Secretary of State for Business and Trade, Kemi Badenoch and Minister of State for International Trade, Nigel Huddleston, ways to make progress on the FTA negotiations and wider trade and investment opportunities for the UK and India.

India’s engineering exports declined by 11% YoY to $8.53bn in June 2023, with shipments to the US, the EU, and China leading the drop, according to the Engineering Exports Promotion Council of India (EEPC). Exports to the US fell to $1.45bn, a 12.5% dip; to the EU slumped by 16.2% to $1.51bn and to China […]

As per experts, at this rate, electronics is likely to emerge as the third largest category of exports in the coming quarters as its gap with the current gems and jewellery segment is narrowing fast. Electronics have overtaken chemicals and drugs and pharmaceuticals to jump from sixth largest exports category to become the fourth largest […]

Under the Market Access Initiatives (MAI) Scheme, startups and new exporters have been made eligible for airfare reimbursement to participate in overseas events while the ceiling for this incentive for existing exporters has been raised 20%.

India has removed retaliatory customs duties on eight US products. Among these were almonds, walnuts, and chickpeas as the country looks to resolve its trade disputes with the US. Retaliatory charges had been imposed on 28 US products in response to America’s decision to levy extra import taxes on certain steel and aluminium products. The […]