Want India to coordinate with Nepal to improve road connectivity: Nepal commerce minister

Nepal has proposed 4 additional transit points for land trade with India

India should expediently coordinate with Nepal to improve road connectivity and bolster bilateral trade, Commerce minister of Nepal, Romi Gauchan Thakali, said.

Speaking at the Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation (BIMSTEC) business summit organised by industry body Confederation of Indian Industry, Thakali said it is disheartening to also note that connectivity within the BIMSTEC region remains extremely low.

"Nepal has submitted a list of four additional transit points to increase land border trade between the two nations," Thakali added. Most trade with Nepal currently happens through the border at Raxaul.

BIMSTEC comprises seven nations lying in the adjacent areas of the Bay of Bengal – India, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Nepal, Myanmar, Sri Lanka and Thailand.

While a framework agreement to establish a Free Trade Area (FTA) was signed by BIMSTEC nations back in 2004, a FTA is still to be operationalised.

More than 20 rounds of negotiation have happened over the past 20 years, but differences over merchandise and services trade remain.

While negotiations currently take place on the basis of reducing the negative list of commodities between nations, countries have increasingly felt the need to move towards a system which tries to remove barriers, experts said.

Nepal is also looking for affirmative action on the 'action list' of commodities – commodities on which trade is allowed, Thakali said. Almost 23 per cent of all commodities traded in the bloc currently stand in the negative list.

Negotiations on trade in merchandise goods are nearly done, a commerce ministry official said.

Intra-regional trade within BIMSTEC currently stands at only 2.8 per cent as compared to total trade conducted by the nations.