India US Trade Deal Talks: Talks between India and America, India will buy American products worth Rs 47 lakh crore

Business Desk – India US Trade Deal Talks: High-level trade talks between India and America are going to start from Monday. This will last for four days. Officials of both the countries will meet in Delhi to finalize the interim trade agreement, the framework of which was decided in February this year.

Purpose of the meeting: To give final legal shape to the interim agreement.

The US delegation is being led by its chief negotiator, Brendan Lynch during this four-day meeting. At the same time, the Indian team is being led by Darpan Jain, Additional Secretary in the Ministry of Commerce and India’s Chief Negotiator.

According to the Commerce Ministry, the main objective of this meeting is to give final legal shape to the interim agreement. In addition, both sides will take forward discussions on synergy on several important areas such as market access, non-tariff measures, customs duties, trade facilitation, investment promotion and economic security under a comprehensive bilateral trade agreement (BTA).

Recalibration

On February 7, the two countries finalized the framework of an interim agreement, which was seen as the first phase of a comprehensive bilateral trade agreement. Under this framework, the US had agreed to reduce the tariffs imposed on India from 50% to 18%.

Additionally, the 25% tariff already imposed on Indian goods was imposed in response to India purchasing Russian oil. was to be removed, while the remaining 25% tariff was to be reduced to 18%.

On February 20, the US Supreme Court ruled against massive “reciprocating tariffs” imposed by President Trump under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act of 1977 (IEEPA). Following this decision, on February 24, Trump announced the imposition of a uniform 10% tariff on all countries for a period of 150 days.

Due to this significant change in policy, trade talks scheduled for February were postponed. Subsequently, in April (from 20 to 23 April) the Indian delegation visited Washington. Now, the US delegation has come to India to take these talks forward. In view of the changing geopolitical scenario, both the countries will have to re-evaluate the terms of this deal.

India will buy products worth $500 billion from America

Under the currently established framework, India has proposed to eliminate or reduce tariffs on a variety of US industrial goods and agricultural products. These mainly include dried distillers grains (DDGs), red sorghum (for animal feed), tree nuts, fresh and processed fruits, soybean oil, wine and spirits.

In return, India has expressed its intention to buy energy products, aircraft and aircraft parts, precious metals, technical products and coking coal worth about $500 billion (about Rs 47 lakh crore) from America in the next five years.

What is an interim trade agreement?

Negotiating a comprehensive free trade agreement (FTA) between two countries is a time-consuming process, often taking months or even years. In the meantime, both countries can reach a small, temporary agreement to provide immediate mutual benefits. This is called interim trade agreement.