India on Tuesday flagged market access issues being confronted by home gamers from a number of sectors similar to metal, engineering and agri merchandise in Korea and sought redressal of the matter with a view to spice up bilateral trade ties, an official stated.
The difficulty was raised during the assembly between Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal and Korean Trade Minister Yeo Han-koo. Certain business teams are of the view that on account of some stringent regulatory issues in Korea, there are difficulties in phrases of market access for Indian merchandise.
“These boundaries must be addressed and a few concessions must be made on either side,” the official stated. Among the merchandise which might be dealing with market access issues in Korea are bovine meat, grapes, pomegranate, okra and eggplants. The Indian aspect additionally raised its considerations over the widening trade deficit with Korea.
The deficit has elevated from USD 5 billion in 2008-09 to USD 8 billion in 2020-21. Both the international locations carried out the Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA), a type of free-trade pact, in January 2010. The bilateral trade between the international locations stood at USD 17.5 billion in 2020-21.
The trade is in favour of Korea. In the final fiscal, India’s imports stood at USD 128 billion whereas exports have been solely USD 4.7 billion.
During the assembly, India sought investments from Korean firms in sectors like semiconductors, chemical batteries for e-vehicles, and technical textiles. India’s share in whole metal exports to the Republic of Korea is abysmally low and averaged a meagre 0.04 MMT each year during the last 5 years.
According to business specialists, Korean metal firms favor to do enterprise with companies with which they’ve prior expertise of enterprise relations and this stuff act as an implicit barrier for accessing the Korean metal market.
Similarly, in the case of rice, Korea has launched the tariff fee quota (TRQ) association for the import of rice from January 2020, below which 3,88,700 tonnes is allotted to its 5 main importing companions — China, USA, Vietnam, Thailand and Australia. And, consequently, solely 20,000 tonnes is left for all different international locations throughout the globe together with India. Indian textiles exporters face the problem of the Korean Certification mark. This mark is required on textile/attire objects (together with footwear and leather-based merchandise) to be imported or bought in Korea. Complaints have additionally been obtained from Indian exporters of engineering items on necessities of native certification from a Korean company, which is a time-consuming course of and takes on a median of 27-28 weeks.
Meanwhile, a joint press communique issued after the assembly of the trade ministers stated that either side have agreed to impart contemporary momentum to the discussions on CEPA up-gradation negotiations and in addition promote intensive business-to-business interactions on trade and funding between the business leaders of the 2 international locations.
“The two ministers agreed…to deal with difficulties expressed by the business from either side and instructed their respective negotiating groups to meet frequently in order to conclude the CEPA up-gradation negotiations as quickly as doable (and) in a time-bound method,” it stated. They anticipate to attain the goal of USD 50 billion trade earlier than 2030, it added.
(This story has not been edited by Business Standard workers and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Dear Reader,
Business Standard has all the time strived exhausting to offer up-to-date data and commentary on developments which might be of curiosity to you and have wider political and financial implications for the nation and the world. Your encouragement and fixed suggestions on methods to enhance our providing have solely made our resolve and dedication to those beliefs stronger. Even during these tough instances arising out of Covid-19, we proceed to stay dedicated to protecting you knowledgeable and up to date with credible information, authoritative views and incisive commentary on topical issues of relevance.
We, nonetheless, have a request.
As we battle the financial affect of the pandemic, we’d like your assist much more, in order that we will proceed to give you extra high quality content material. Our subscription mannequin has seen an encouraging response from lots of you, who’ve subscribed to our on-line content material. More subscription to our on-line content material can solely assist us obtain the objectives of providing you even higher and extra related content material. We imagine in free, honest and credible journalism. Your assist by extra subscriptions may also help us practise the journalism to which we’re dedicated.
Support high quality journalism and subscribe to Business Standard.
Digital Editor