The Hindu Business Line : EU wants 90% of trade volumes under free trade pact

Kolkata, April 29 The European Union wants 90 per cent of the current trade volumes between India and the EU to be covered under the Free Trade Agreement (FTA) that is currently under discussion.

According to Ms Daniele Smadja, Ambassador of the EU to India, Bhutan and Nepal, talks on the FTA between India and the EU have been under way since last year and the EU wishes that 90 per cent of the current trade volumes between the EU and India would be covered under the FTA. This would auger well for enhanced trade volumes between the two parties , who got into a “strategic partnership” in 2004.

“Bilateral trade between India and EU currently stands at €68 billion annually (€1.3 billion ) and is more or less evenly balanced. This is not much compared with the potential. We need to move forward from WTO and remove all barriers in trade and services. There is room for elimination of non-tariff barriers, there is scope for Indian participation in government procurement in the EU and European companies can participate in the development of the infrastructure segment in India,” she said while addressing members of the Indian Chamber of Commerce here.

Ms Smadja said the EU was a regional grouping and it would be interested in exchange of trade and services with SAARC countries, which was a similar regional grouping. “The future of India and EU also depends upon investments in today’s knowledge economy,” she said, and added that Indian IT companies were welcome to invest in the EU.

On the issue of climate change, she said both the EU and India “have an important role to play in shaping ways to tackle global climate change”.

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