Commerce and industry Minister Piyush Goyal is likely to visit Europe from April 28 for talks with top officials of all key geographies in the continent with which trade agreements are in final stages or have already been signed, but yet to be operationalised.
The minister’s visit will cover London, Brussels and Norway. He will first touchdown in London then will proceed to Norway and Brussels.
The European Union is run from Brussels while Norway is part of the European Free Trade Association (EFTA). The long-delayed Free Trade Agreement with the UK is on the verge of closure, whie talks with the EU are being speeded up to finalise the FTA by year-end.
India and EU started negotiations on FTA in June 2022 and so far held 10 rounds of talks. The 11th round of talks with the EU will happen in New Delhi from May 12 to May 16.
With EFTA, India had signed a Trade and Economic Partnership Agreement (TEPA) in March last year. It is expected to become operational by June as the national parliaments of all four EFTA members – Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway, and Switzerland – have ratified it. Now the pact is awaiting referendum in Swiss cantons (equivalent to states in India).
The FTA negotiations with the UK are also on the verge of conclusion and no more negotiating rounds are required, according to officials. Both sides are tying up remaining loose ends on their Bilateral Investment Treaty (BIT) before both pacts are signed simultaneously as per the original plan.
The economic deal making worldwide has reached a feverish pace after US President Donald Trump initiated unilateral tariff increases that have left no country untouched. Faced with uncertainty every country is talking to whoever they can for deals that protect their exports and supply chains. In this process each country seems willing to be more open to trade and imports. The urgency seen in the case of the UK and EU to finish the negotiations that have been going on in some form or the other for the past 17 years is the case in point.
The fastest trade pact that India is expected to sign will be with the US. While the deadline for completing negotiations for the Bilateral Trade Agreement (BTA) is autumn, officials expect to beat that deadline.