The Hindu Business Line : CII to submit inputs for signing FTAs

The Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) has said that its committee on World Trade Organisation (WTO) and other Trade Agreements was finalising a list of recommendations for signing Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) and would submit it to the Government soon.

Mr R.V. Kanoria, Chairman of the CII Committee on WTO and other Trade Agreements, said that the Government should consider the recommendations as industry inputs for negotiating FTAs.

The guidelines would include issues of negative list, common floor tariff and rules of origin.

Mr Kanoria felt that a multilateral agreement for trade liberalisation under WTO would be more suitable for India compared to bilateral trade and investment agreements.

He said that bilateral agreements had divergent standards with different countries that might not help India remain competitive in the international market.

Mr Kanoria, however, cautioned that unilateral liberalisation of tariff should be calibrated with internal reforms such as labour reforms, agriculture reforms and infrastructure development.

Without such calibrations, the Indian industry would become uncompetitive in global and domestic markets, he said.

On the on-going negotiations at the World Trade Organisation, Mr Kanoria said the CII felt that for the Doha Round to succeed, member countries of the WTO need to focus on the development objective of the Round.

He said that the Doha Round was launched for improving market access for developing countries and it must stick to that objective and not shift focus to look at increasing market access opportunities for developed countries.

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