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US Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross and Commerce and Industry Minister Suresh Prabhu will discuss key issues such as India’s FDI rules for e-commerce and import duties on IT and electronics and the US penal duties on steel and aluminium at the US-India Commercial Dialogue next week, a government official said.
Top CEOs from both countries led by ATC’s James Taiclet and Tata Son’s N Chandrasekaran will also brainstorm on areas of bilateral cooperation and point out problems at the India-US CEO Forum to be held simultaneously on February 14.
“The two sides have agreed to hold both the commercial dialogue and the CEO Forum on February 14 in New Delhi. We expect a lot of action as there are a number of unresolved issues from the both sides that would be taken up and the areas of future cooperation, too, would be spelt out,” the official said.
While there have been a lot of niggling trade issues between India and the US over the past year, diplomatic relations between the two countries remained strong. “We are hopeful that the Commercial Dialogue will address many issues that have caused bitterness recently,” the official said.
Washington is peeved with New Delhi for tightening FDI rules on e-commerce that would force US majors such as Amazon and Walmart to change their model of operation in the online space in India and could cause revenue loss.
The US is also unhappy with India imposing import duties on smart phones and some other electronic and telecom equipments which the country claims is in violation of the World Trade Organization’s (WTO) IT Agreement.
India, on the other hand, is upset with America’s refusal to remove penal duties on its steel and aluminium and also wants waiver from sanctions on oil purchase from Iran, given by the US, to continue beyond April 2019.
The Commercial Dialogue will also focus on issues including standards, business climate and investment and travel and tourism, the official added.
The areas that the India-US CEO Forum will look at include MSME, ICT, infrastructure and logistics, energy and environment, finance, healthcare and pharmaceuticals, defence and aerospace and media and entertainment.
The CEO Forum will present a report on the progress made in the key areas since the last meeting and also lay down goals for the future. The CEOs will bring out a list of potential areas of cooperation between the US and Indian governments.
Trade deficit
The US trade deficit with India bridged by almost six per cent in 2017 to $22.9 billion, according to the ‘Trade Estimate 2018' released by the USTR earlier this year. India believes that with purchase of oil and gas from the US for the first time in 2018 worth about $3 billion, the deficit would go down further.
Washington, however, wants India to give greater market access to its industry so that the deficit could be bridged further, but New Delhi says that there is not much it can do as it has not imposed any country-specific barriers against American goods.
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