India-US to resume trade talks in January after year-end holiday pause

Talks are going on for the last nine months, with no outcome, despite over a half dozen rounds of in-person formal and informal negotiations

Talks on the proposed trade deal between India and the United States will resume after the year-end holidays, coinciding with Sergio Gor--a close aide of American President Donald Trump--taking charge as the US Ambassador to India in early January, according to a person privy to the development. 

Discussions are currently on a pause due to the year-end holiday season. “No talks are happening at the moment (even virtually),” the person cited above said. 

India and the US have missed the ‘Fall’ deadline to finalise the first phase of a bilateral trade agreement (BTA). 

Talks are going on for the last nine months, with no outcome in sight, despite over a half dozen rounds of in-person formal and informal negotiations. The US trade team headed by the Deputy US Trade Representative (USTR) Rick Switzer visited New Delhi last week. 

 

According to a Bloomberg report, USTR Jamieson Greer recently critiqued the practices of two trade partners, including India, signalling that the contentious talks could spill over into the new year. Greer also said that negotiations with India that began earlier this year still haven’t resulted in an agreement, noting that the US had concluded deals with a slew of other trade partners in the interim. 

For close to two months now, the Indian side has been reiterating that there’s no need for a fresh round of negotiation and most differences have been narrowed down. The US side, however, has been insisting that agriculture-related market access, digital trade, and non-tariff barriers are some of the issues that still need to be sorted. 

India and the US are pursuing two parallel tracks. 

One is the broad BTA, which will take time to materialise. The other one is the “protracted negotiations” with the US on a framework trade deal that will address the burden of the 50 per cent reciprocal tariff on Indian exporters. 

Last week, commerce secretary Rajesh Agrawal had said that both countries are close to finalising a framework trade agreement, which is expected to be concluded “soon”. 

He, however, did not specify a timeline for finalising the much-awaited pact. 

“We have had five-six rounds of negotiations (with the US), where we have discussed the full-fledged BTA (bilateral trade agreement) and also an interim agreement/a framework trade deal, which addresses the reciprocal tariff…We are close to a framework deal, but I would not like to put a timeline to it,” Agrawal had said.