In their first phone call since Truss assumed office earlier this week, Modi conveyed his condolences on the death of Queen Elizabeth II on behalf of all Indians and paid tribute to the 96-year-old late monarch's "lifetime of service".
The apex body for liquor firms Confederation of Indian Alcoholic Beverage Companies has urged the government to gradually reduce customs duties on British alcoholic beverages under the proposed India-UK free trade agreement to support domestic players. India and the UK have formally launched negotiations for an FTA, under which duties would be reduced or eliminated on several goods traded between the two countries. The Confederation of Indian Alcoholic Beverage Companies (CIABC) has also suggested the government to ensure that the UK allows the selling of domestic whiskies as 'Indian Whisky', irrespective of whether they are made from malt, grain spirits or molasses-based spirits.
The government is targeting export of goods and services worth $2 trillion by 2030.
Worried by a spike in Chinese imports, the Indian Steel Association (ISA) plans to take up the matter with the government and seek measures to fix "trade distortions". Alok Sahay, secretary general of the group that represents the country's steel producers, said systemic changes were needed. "In order to take any trade measure, it takes a minimum of 15 months' time, due to prevalence of lesser duty rule in India, making India an easy target. "We are going to write to the government on this," he said.
India's first-ever Olympic medallist in women's boxing Mary Kom has been honoured with the Global Indian Icon of the Year award at the annual UK-India Awards in Windsor.
British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak on Wednesday green lit a new youth mobility partnership scheme that will offer 3,000 visas to 18-30-year-old degree-educated Indians every year to live and work in the United Kingdom for up to two years.
Britain's third female prime Minister, Liz Truss, was out of office on Thursday after the shortest tenure at 10 Downing Street in London and without a cherished India-UK free trade agreement (FTA) under her belt as a Brexit prize.
Their favourite alternatives: Malaysia, Vietnam and the Philippines. Note, India is missing from that list. And this is despite an attractive financial incentive scheme for OSAT players. The reason, said a senior executive of a US chip company who had a meeting in Taiwan just a few weeks ago, is that "they want more predictability in government policy because they plan to put in big money."
Emphasising that various issues are on agenda at the G20 under India's leadership.
Johnson's first visit to India as United Kingdom prime minister will begin on April 21 with a trip to Ahmedabad in Gujarat, which is Prime Minister Modi's home state.
Newly-elected Conservative Party leader and prime minister in waiting Liz Truss is among the senior British politicians known for championing deeper India-UK strategic and economic ties, describing them as a "sweet spot" of global trade dynamics.
A healthy growth in India's services segments has helped the country's total exports and imports of goods and services to cross the $800 billion mark during the first half of 2023, despite a slowdown in global demand, think tank GTRI said in a report on Monday. According to the analysis of the Global Trade Research Initiative (GTRI), exports of goods and services rose by 1.5 per cent to $385.4 billion during January-June this year, as against $379.5 billion in January-June 2022. Imports, however, dipped by 5.9 per cent to $415.5 billion during the six months of this year, as against $441.7 billion in January-June 2022.
The visit, which is expected around April 22, is long overdue after Johnson was forced to cancel planned visits to India twice last year due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
India has got the second set of Swiss bank account details of its nationals and entities under the automatic exchange of information pact with Switzerland, marking a key milestone in the government's fight against black money allegedly stashed abroad.
Eyeing greater cooperation with South East Asian countries on economic and security issues, India on Thursday announced a separate Mission for ASEAN region to be set up in Jakarta with a full-time resident Ambassador.
Spiraling steel prices led the government to cut customs duty by 2.5-5.5 per cent on a range of products from semi-finished to flat and long products for the benefit of MSMEs, that have been at the receiving end.
Go-getter, ambitious, dynamic, workaholic are some of the adjectives that officials who worked closely with B V R Subrahmanyam use to describe him.
Exports had recovered in November to grow at 0.59 per cent from a 12 per cent contraction in October.
British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak on Monday unveiled a new scheme for the world's 100 most talented young professionals in the field of artificial intelligence (AI) as part of his vision to make the UK a "beacon" to attract the "brightest and best" from around the world. Addressing the Confederation of British Industry (CBI) annual conference in Birmingham, Sunak told an audience of business chiefs and professionals that control over the country's post-Brexit immigration policy remains crucial. However, he pledged to create "one of the world's most attractive visa regimes for entrepreneurs and highly skilled people" and make use of the "Brexit freedoms" to strike trade deals with "the world's fastest-growing economies".
'For the common man, the economic conditions are not going to get better.'
The CEOs on both sides, headed by Thomas d'Aquino, chief executive and president of Canadian Council of Chief Executives, and Tarun Das, president of Confederation of Indian Industries, submitted a 14-page report on September 2 to the two trade ministers in Canada and India for their considerations and follow-up actions.
Consumers can expect duty-free imports of a range of products like capital goods, some textiles, electronic goods and chemicals from next year after India successfully concluded negotiations on a Free Trade Agreement for goods with the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations in Singapore on Thursday.
Panagariya also stressed that India must continue the liberalisation of its top tariff rates and the country should not revert back to import substitution.
Amid demands for snapping trade ties with China for its transgressions on the border, former Niti Aayog vice chairman Arvind Panagariya has opined that cutting trade with Beijing at this juncture would amount to sacrificing India's potential economic growth. Instead, Panagariya suggested that India should try to enter into free trade agreements (FTA) with countries such as the UK and the European Union to expand its trade. "Engaging China in a trade war at this juncture will mean sacrificing a considerable part of our potential growth... purely on economic grounds, it will be unwise to take any action in response to it (transgressions on the border)," the eminent economist told PTI.
Indian drug firms get a shot in the arm in the $12 bn Australian drug market as the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA), Australia agrees to accelerate the drug approval process in that country for Indian players who already have an approved plant and product from one of the stringent regulatory authorities like US, EU or Canada. From current sales of $340 mn, the Indian firms can see a significant upside in sales; felt Dinesh Dua, former chairman of the Pharmaceutical Exports Promotion Council of India (Pharmexcil), and the MD of Nectar Lifesciences. He highlighted that only 12 percent of the Australian drug market is generic, as against 80-90 per cent in the US or EU. Of this $1.5 bn generic drug market in India, Indian companies have a small share.
'We have got Brexit done and we can now take full advantage of the fantastic opportunities available to us as an independent trading nation, striking trade deals with other partners around the world,' Downing Street said in a statement.
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has made a clear break with the past on UK-China relations as he declared that the "so-called golden era" of bilateral ties is over in the face of the "systemic challenge" posed by the Chinese regime to British values and interests.
The talks between the two leaders covered the entire gamut of bilateral ties as well as key regional and global issues, including the Ukraine conflict.
Among the current FTAs with significant trade deficits for India, five are with countries from the 10-nation Asean bloc. Exports to the 10 economies stood at $ 37.4 billion in 2018-19, up by 9% year on year. On the other hand, imports were higher at $ 59.31 billion, up by 25% from the previous year's $ 47.13 billion.
India has received the third set of Swiss bank account details of its nationals under an automatic exchange of information pact with Switzerland, as part of an annual exercise under which the European nation has shared the particulars of nearly 33 lakh financial accounts with 96 countries.
Braverman, 42, resigned from the cabinet of former prime minister Liz Truss last week, having breached the ministerial code by sending secure information from her private email.
The action came after investigations carried out by an inter-ministerial committee formed by the home ministry in 2020.
Currently, the trade between India and Association of South East Asian Nations stood at $80 billion.
A feasibility study on the proposed Free Trade Agreement, officially known as the Comprehensive Economic Cooperation Agreement, has long been finalised but cannot be acted upon in the absence of Russia joining the WTO.
Stating the volume of trade between India and Finland is "not big enough", Finnish Minister for Foreign Trade Alexander Stubb today said it would increase only after signing of the much-talked about free trade agreement between India and European Union.
Two-way trade between ASEAN and India in 2011-12 reached $80 billion.
As India goes into firming up trade deals with developed nations like Australia, the United Kingdom (UK) and the regional bloc, and the European Union (EU), it will have to be well prepared to negotiate on new-generation issues, such as data protection regulation, e-commerce, and environment. India is yet to negotiate pacts with its trading partners on these evolving issues since discussions between them have until now been largely focused on tariff and non-tariff barriers and the rules of origin. "We can no longer look at trade just as trade. We have to look at it in totality of global and regional conditions.
After his wide-ranging talks with Modi on the second and final day of his India visit, Johnson said the new defence and security partnership will enable India to strengthen its domestic defence industry as well as help the two countries protect vital shared interests in the Indo-Pacific.
The visit next week, which is yet to be formally announced by Downing Street, follows the successful completion of four out of 26 chapters in the ongoing India-UK free trade agreement negotiations.
India-ASEAN Free Trade Agreement talks are in troubled waters with Asean insisting on New Delhi to eliminate its big list of negative items, contrary to the stand taken by the former.
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