PUNE - From not being taken seriously by countries when they first mooted free trade agreements, India now has nations looking forward to signing agreements with it, said Piyush Goyal, Union Minister for Commerce and Industry, Textiles and Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution.

The Minister said that the world had accepted India as a trading partner they could trust.

There was good progress in the FTA with UK and Canada. Similarly, he expected a deeper engagement and expansion of bilateral trade with the US. Goyal said the US commerce secretary, Gina Raimondo would lead a delegation to India on March 8.

Speaking at the Asia Economic Dialogue 2023 organised by the Pune International Centre and the Ministry of External Affairs in Pune, Goyal said as the US does not have Congressional support for getting into free trade agreements in the future, they have devised the India Pacific Economic Framework, which has been conceptualised as an alternative framework.

Though market access may not be offered yet it would enable the country to get closer to the US’ resilient supply chains, have technology partnerships and open up economies through indirect measures that go outside the realm of a free trade agreement.

The Minister said the country did the fastest-ever FTA in the history of the world with the India-UAE agreement having been completed in 88 days.

“We also completed a fast FTA with Australia. That is the enthusiasm the world is demonstrating towards working with India. We have negotiations going on with Israel, Canada, the EU, the UK and GCC. Russia and its partner countries of EAU too want to fast-track negotiations with India,” he said.

About the FTA with Europe, he said there were 27 countries involved and it was much more time-consuming and EU was bureaucratic in their approach so that would take time, he said.