India will soon initiate the feasibility process to launch negotiations for a free trade agreement with Russia and Peru, a move aimed at enhancing economic ties with these nations, Commerce Secretary Rajeev Kher said today.
Kher also said the new foreign trade policy (FTP) would be announced after the Budget, that would give a direction to India's efforts to enhance engagements with its trading partners.
He said India is in the process of increasing its economic engagement with regions including Latin America, Africa, South Asia, West Asia and Central Asia.
India will begin work towards "looking at the feasibility of regional trading arrangements with Peru and Russia very shortly," he said.
"In fact a joint study group (JSG) for both these countries have been already constituted and we believe that in the next three to six months, we will have reports of the JSGs and thereafter...The process of negotiating trade agreement will start," Kher added.
He was speaking at the CII's International Engineering and Technology Fair (IETF) 2015 here.
Before starting negotiations for FTA, both countries constitute a joint study group to look into feasibility of entering into the trade pact.
The Secretary also said that efforts are on to engage through an institutional method with various regions of Africa "because that is where growth has sustained for a long time and that is where we believe prospects are strong (for India)".
India is also part of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) pact, that has 16 members.
"The whole idea of all of these negotiations are to look for expanding opportunities and to look for collaborations which offer our industry an opportunity to find a toehold on various value chains.
"(This is)... To see how we can re-orient our trade policy primarily driven by the desire to become a participant in the global value chains which has hitherto to an extent bypassed India in several product areas," he said.
Kher said India is trying to look at how it can create regional value chains within the neighbourhood - South Asia, South-East Asia, Central Asia and West Asia.
"So all of this is in the works and we are trying to create a roadmap which will help us in engaging for the next 10 years," he added.
Further, he emphasised on the need to focus on services sector, vital to make manufacturing competitive.
"India's trade in value added services (TIVA) is rated at 42. That means 42 per cent of product on an average is composed of services.
"We need to promote our services. We are organising a global exhibition on services which is scheduled in April," he added.
