Dear ESC Member,
As you are aware, India has signed Free Trade Agreements (FTA), Regional Trade Agreements (RTA) and Preferential Trade Agreements (PTA) with various countries for promotion of bilateral trade. In several cases, the negotiations are still going on and these are under discussions.
Regional Trade Agreements (RTAs) are defined as groupings of countries which are formed with the objective of reducing barriers to trade between member countries. Contrary to what the name suggests, these groupings or unions may be concluded between countries not necessarily belonging to the same geographical region.
Depending upon their level of integration, RTAs can be broadly divided into five categories namely ; (PTAs), (FTAs), Customs Unions (CUs),Common Markets and Economic Unions. A PTA is a union in which member countries impose lower trade barriers on goods produced within the union, with some flexibility for each member country on the extent of the reduction. A Free Trade Area (FTA) is a special case of PTA where member countries completely abolish trade barriers (both tariff barriers and non-tariff barriers) for goods origination within the member countries.
India's Current Engagements in RTAs are as under :-
Some of the Agreements already concluded are as under :-
Other Agreements/ Negotiations are with Malaysia, ASEAN, Chile, GCC States, Thailand, India-EU, India-US, India-Australia, Bangladesh, Ceylon, DPR Korea, Indonesia, Maldives, Mongolia, New Zealand, Pakistan, India-US Commercial Dialogue, India-Russia Joint Task Force. In addition, various MOUs have been signed between India-Bangaldesh, India-Indonesia and India-Vietnam.
Copies of the these FTAs / Negotiations / MOUs are available at Department of Commerce website : www.commerce.gov.in
Members are requested to kindly go through these Agreements / Negotiations and let us know the opportunities areas and send a list of items pertaining to Electronics and IT sector at ITC(HS) 6 Digit level. The items / list recommended by individual members for inclusion / deletion in any of the FTAs / PTAs / Negotiations may urgently be sent to this Council. ESC will prepare a Comprehensive Memorandum and inputs sent by individual members will be incorporated in the Memorandum for submission to the Department of Commerce for necessary changes in the FTA / PTAs.
It is requested that above may be given highest priority and the inputs may please be sent to vgupta@escindia.com or csrawat@escindia.com latest by 25th July, 2012.
