India and Britain will hold the next round of talks in June for the proposed free trade agreement and both sides aim to complete the talks at the earliest. A senior government official gave this information on Monday.
Director General of Foreign Trade (DGFT) Santosh Kumar Sarangi said trade talks are a matter of give and take and have nothing to do with elections in individual countries.
There will be general elections in India next year.
“There is an attempt to accelerate the talks … (there was a) Diwali The deadline (to conclude the talks last year) was given, but it was extended due to various reasons. But both sides are trying to end it as soon as possible.
The 10th round of talks is here between June 5-9 and hopefully we will make some concrete progress during that time.
The talks were started on January 13, 2021. The dialogue comprises 26 policy areas/chapters.
Investment is being negotiated as a separate agreement – the Bilateral Investment Treaty – which will be concluded alongside the India-UK Free Trade Agreement (FTA).
So far the 13 chapters have been largely closed and regular meetings have been held at the high level to review the progress of negotiations and resolve outstanding issues.
He also informed that the fifth round of talks for a trade deal between India and the European Union (EU) is to be held in India from June 19-23.
Four rounds of talks have been completed till March.
During the last round, 21 policy areas were discussed in 74 technical sessions.
Both sides also discussed the modalities for exchange of offers in goods and services.
The Commerce Secretary of India and the Director General (Trade) of the European Union will meet in August to review the progress.
Regarding the India-Canada trade agreement, the DGFT said that negotiations on market access for goods and services are at an advanced stage.
The seventh round of talks was held in Ottawa, Canada during 3–6 April.
In addition to traditional areas, the interim agreement may include areas such as SMEs, trade and gender, environment and labour.
On the comprehensive India-Australia agreement, he said good progress has been made on the agreed tracks and a detailed action plan with indicative timelines has been drawn up.
The third and fourth rounds of talks are envisaged to be held by the two countries during June 5-16 and July 3-14, respectively, to pave the way for an early conclusion of the talks.
On the G20 talks, he said the second Trade and Investment Working Group (TIWG) meeting is now scheduled to be held in Bengaluru on May 23-25.
In dedicated technical sessions, the G20 delegates will deliberate on priority issues on World Trade Organization (WTO) reform, as well as identified priority issues on trade for growth and prosperity, resilient global value chains, integrating MSMEs into global trade Will discuss efficient logistics for doing and trading. ,
The meeting will set the stage for building a consensus among the G20 countries on the deliverables and outcomes proposed by India on global trade and investment related issues.
The DGFT said that Russia does not have any reserves of Indian currency in special Vostro accounts in India.
These accounts are permitted to be opened by foreign banks in India by the Reserve Bank of India to facilitate international trade in rupees.
“If you are talking about reserves under the special Vostro account, they (Russia) do not have any reserves… The reserves are purely on account of some of their defense purchases and sales and I have no comment on that,” he said. There is no information.
“Because of that I would not know what exactly the reserves are and what is the mechanism to deal with it,” he said.
Sarangi said the talks (to deal with the stockpile) would be between the Department of Economic Affairs and the Ministry of Defence.
(This story has not been edited by News18 staff and is published from a syndicated news agency feed)