INDIA TO PRESENT FRESH PACKAGE IN TRADE TALKS WITH U.S., SAYS GOYAL
WASHINGTON: India said on Wednesday it will “put together a fresh package” in trade talks with the new Biden administration in the US that will go beyond “nitpicking” and constant shifting of goalposts, which bogged down the last round of discussions with the Trump administration. India and the US failed to agree on a deal that was pared down considerably in expectations to a “mini” agreement to allow for a quick resolution of some long-standing issues .
Union commerce minister Piyush Goyal said he “will engage with the new USTR (trade representative) to try and put together a fresh package”. He also said India is keen to expand in the digital space with the US, but “we would be conscious of our responsibility to the people of India for data privacy”.
WASHINGTON: India said on Wednesday it will “put together a fresh package” in trade talks with the new Biden administration in the US that will go beyond “nitpicking” and constant shifting of goalposts, which bogged down the last round of discussions with the Trump administration.
India and the US failed to agree on a deal that was pared down considerably in expectations to a “mini” agreement — also called an “interim” deal — to allow for a quick resolution of some long-standing issues that could pave the way for a more ambitious free trade agreement at a future date.
Union commerce minister Piyush Goyal said he “will engage with the new USTR (US trade representative) to try and put together a fresh package”.
“I think the old one is now off the table. We’ll have to all look afresh at different ideas and see how our engagement in the future can, really, course-correct some of the problems that we’ve seen in the past,” he added. Goyal and his US counterpart, Katherine Tai, the nominee for USTR, have yet to meet or hold talks primarily because she is yet to be confirmed by the US senate.
The last round of trade talks between Goyal and Robert Lighthizer, who was the USTR for former US President Donald Trump, failed despite expectations of a resolution being close at hand. Goyal at one stage expressed optimism that the deal was just a few phone calls away.
Indian officials have long complained privately that the Trump administration kept adding to its list of demands, pushing away an agreement every time it looked imminent.
“I think the last time around when we were discussing, we were nitpicking with very small issues and changing the goalposts in every subsequent conversation,” Goyal said at a virtual event hosted by the Us-india Business Council (USIBC).
“I do hope this time around, we can look at the big picture,” he said. “We have to sort out some of the issues which are much more relevant to a larger engagement and leave some of the small things, which earlier were kind of dealbreakers and therefore, a lot of management bandwidth or political bandwidth was going into very small issues. I think we need to leave those aside and move into the orbit of a much greater engagement.”
Trade differences have been the single largest drag on India-us bilateral ties recently, even as cooperation on healthcare, defence and IT grows.
The Trump administration terminated India’s special benefits under a US trade programme to force India to give US companies access to its dairy sector and free medical devices from price regulations.
We’ll have to all look afresh at different ideas and see how our engagement in the future can course-correct... PIYUSH GOYAL,
Union minister