Technology, defence cooperation on agenda at US-India talks

Digital infrastructure, emerging technologies, defence and aerospace are high on the agenda at the US-India Commercial Dialogue on February 14, when commerce and industry minister Suresh Prabhu meets US Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross.

Though India and the US are negotiating a mutually agreeable bilateral trade package to resolve a plethora of contentious issues — including import duties on US information and communication technology products, dairy imports, data localisation and preferential tariffs for Indian exports — these are unlikely to be taken up, as they fall in the ambit of the United States Trade Representative (USTR) office, which will not be represented at the daylong meeting.

“The commercial dialogue is limited to cooperation; that is the main focus. Issues with USTR are not part of the structured agenda,” an official aware of the details told ET. “No USTR official is part of the meeting. However, other issues could come up in one to one meetings between officials.”


However, the meeting assumes importance in the wake of the US’ concern of its trade deficit with India. India’s trade surplus with the US was $21.27 billion in 2017-18. In the April-November period of the current fiscal, this gap was $10.5 billion in India’s favour.

While New Delhi has said it can’t commit to the amount by which it can reduce this gap as it is not decided by governments but it has increased its energy and aircraft purchases from the US. The commercial dialogue will further address these concerns especially in the wake of India again deferring imposing retaliatory tariffs worth $235 million on 29 US goods to next month expecting a resolution of the existing trade issues. “They will also raise select commercial issues,” another official said.

The US-India CEO Forum co-chairs — Tata Sons chairman N Chandrasekaran and American Tower Corporation chairman James Taiclet — will share a list of recommendations and potential areas of collaboration.

Information and communication technology, MSMSEs, infrastructure and logistics, energy, environment, and media and entertainment are the likely issues for cooperation to be taken up at the meeting next week. The governments will share outcomes of 2018 Commercial Dialogue work plan including the three work streams -standards, business climate and investment, and travel and tourism.