The US said that the door is open for India if it's prepared to bring a serious proposal to the table addressing trade-related issues and market access. The proposal ඣcomes after observing that trade has been an area of frustration in bilateral ties.
In the month of November last year, the US revoked duty-free co𓄧ncessions on import of at least 50 Indian products, reflecting the Trump administration's t♔ough stand on trade-related issues with New Delhi. The marority of products belonged to the hand loom and agriculture sectors in India.
A senior State Department official said Friday that the US is proud to 💦be India's largest export market and most important economic partner.
"But we hav🐓e struggled with regulatory issues that get in the way of the ease of doing business and market access for American companies and products," said the official.
&q🌱uot;Trade has frankly been an area of frustration in the relationship, but the door is open if India is prepared to bring a serious proposal to🎀 the table," he said.
Despite intensive engagement with the Government of India for nearly a year, I༒ndia did not assure the US that it would provide equitable and reasonable access to its market, which led to its termination from the Generalised System of Preferences programme, the official said.
"While we were pl🐻eased that the growing US exports to India, largely crude oil and LNG, led to a 7.1 per cent reduction in our bilateral goods trade deficit last year, many structural challenges in our trade relationship have yet to be resolved," said the senior State Depaಞrtment official.
During the just concluded visit of the Foreign Secretary, while the focus was on📖 strategic, defence and regional issues, in particular Pakistan and Afghanistan, but the visiting diplomat is believed to have been conveyed that the ball is in India's court on resolving the trade related issues.
The US is understood to have told India that the Trump administration is willing to review its decision to revoke its GSP privileges to India, if New Delhi comes wit🥃h a credible proposal to address the market access issues that America has been talking about for nearly a year.
The GSP notification is still within the 60 days period, after which the benefits would formally be withdrawn, it is reliably learnt that the US has told Ind♔ia that it is not to🍨o late. But it is unlikely to happen, given that India is now into an election campaign mode, officials on both sides said.
While India argues that it is difficult to take any policy decision at this point of time because of the elections and the model code of conduct, American points out that it has decided to take its decision on revoking GSP privileges only after it exhausted all its optᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚ𒀱ᩚᩚᩚions with India.
During talks with India, America is believed to have said that "there are creative ways of solving" all the trade related issues that addressed concerns ꧙of both the countries.
For instance, there are creative ways of certifying that the dairy products meet Indian standards, and have believed to have talked about creative solutions to certifying vegetarian cows. Similarly access to high end cell phones can be addressed in a way that does n𒉰ot open up the market to China, Americans are believed to have pointed out.
The United States, it is learnt, had been "extraordinarily clear" since April last year on addressing certain market access issues in the absence of which it reportedly told Indi🌼a that it risked losing GSP pღrivileges.
The US still⛄ hopes that the issue can still be resolved before the election and certainly after the elections.
PTI
