Senior India, US officials discuss trade related issues

Ahead of the minister level meeting of the Trade Policy Forum (TPF) tomorrow, senior commerce ministry officials of India and the US today discussed various trade related issues here.
"We had frank exchange of views. We will continue to work together and see how we can work towards a common goal... (several) issues were brought up and discussed and we would like to see each other's perspective on those issues," Commerce Secretary Rajeev Kher told reporters after the meeting.
Deputy USTR Robert Holleyman said both sides discussed various issues.
"We had an excellent engagement. It was a good opportunity to hold discussions...To prepare some advance work for TPF tomorrow. It was a productive discussion and we agreed for a follow up engagement," Holleyman said.

He said a joint statement will be issued tomorrow.
The issues related to visa, totalisation agreement, market access for several agriculture products and IPR are expected to figure in the day long meeting today.

As part of the TPF meeting, Commerce and Industry Minister Nirmala Sitharaman will deliberate on these matters with US Trade Representative (USTR) Michael Froman, the leader of the American delegation, tomorrow.
TPF, which has not met since 2010, is the premier bilateral forum for discussion and resolution of trade and investment issues between the two countries.
The current bilateral trade between the two countries stood at around USD 100 billion.

India has received USD 12.32 billion in FDI from the US companies between April 2000 and August 2014.