India’s commerce minister Piyush Goyal on Friday said he has “a very productive discussion” with US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer on the sidelines of the World Trade Organization Ministerial Conference (WTOMC). The meet is taking place from March 26-29 in Yaoundé, Cameroon.. Goyal and Greer during the WTO meet in Cameroon. (Photo: X/@PiyushGoyal). “Exchanged views on the #WTOMC14 agenda, next steps in the India-US BTA negotiations and explored ways to further deepen our economic cooperation and bilateral trade ties,” Goyal posted on X.. About two weeks, amid the ongoing US-Israel war on Iran, and after the US Supreme Court struck down most of Donald Trump’s tariffs, India’s commerce secretary Rajesh Agrawal had said the signing of the bilateral deal would happen only after a new tariff framework is in place.. India and the US in February announced the finalisation of a framework for the first phase of their bilateral trade agreement. Under the proposed framework, the US had agreed to lower tariffs on Indian goods to 18 per cent.. However, the tariff structure in the US has since changed following a Supreme Court ruling against Trump’s sweeping tariffs. After the ruling, Trump imposed a 10 per cent tariff on all countries for 150 days starting February 24, the PTI report added.. Amid these developments, the meeting between the chief negotiators of India and the US was also postponed. The two sides were scheduled to meet last month to finalise the legal text of the pact, which had earlier been expected to be signed this month.. The commerce secretary had said, “The deal was to be signed in March. (But) When we said this, that time, the Supreme Court judgment on IEEPA (International Emergency Economic Powers Act) tariffs had not come. Now, with the Supreme Court judgment on IEEPA tariffs, the tariffs per se don’t exist. Now there are tariffs under Article 122… around 10 per cent. So the deal that we finalise and sign has to be against the tariff structure or the comparative advantage that India gets in the US market.”. Apart from the US, the government said that it is currently negotiating six Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) with different countries and regional groups as part of efforts to expand trade partnerships.. Negotiations are ongoing with Australia, Sri Lanka, Peru, Chile, the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU), and Israel, another report from news agency ANI added.
