India will press for parallel negotiations on goods and services tomorrow during the meeting of 16 Trade Ministers in Kuala Lumpur, while reviewing the progress on the proposed RCEP deal.
The country wants liberalisation in the services sector under the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) as the segment contributes about 60 per cent to the economy.
Commerce and Industry Minister Nirmala Sitharaman is also expected to raise the issue of inclusion of differential duty concept and non-inclusion of 'ratchet mechanism' and a forward most favoured nation provisions in the mega trade agreement.
The 16-member bloc comprises 10 ASEAN members and their six free trade agreement (FTA) partners namely India, China, Japan, Korea, Australia and New Zealand.
"Parallel negotiations on goods and services are extremely important for the pact. It will benefit all the members," an official said.
Under differential duty concept, duties are imposed unequally upon the same products imported from different countries.
Under the ratchet mechanism, some RCEP members want India to go beyond the current domestic regime in services, providing benefits of future policy liberalisation by removing market access barriers.
Trade Ministers of 16 countries, including India, is meeting to iron out issues related to the mega trade deal.
The 16 economies account for over a quarter of the world economy. RCEP negotiations were launched in Phnom Penh in November 2012.
The meeting assumes significance as the pact is targeted to be concluded this year.
The mega trade deal aims to cover goods and services, investments, economic and technical cooperation, competition and intellectual property.
According to an industry expert, the RCEP members should keep in mind that they would get a market of 1.2 billion people in India.
Earlier, Sitharaman had said that given the comprehensive nature of this engagement and the level of development of the economies within the RCEP, the approach has to be more measured and calibrated taking into account the development imperatives of the constituents.
RCEP is under negotiations and it is an extremely important institutional process which could lead to a plurilateral agreement which will have a significant consequences for partners in the agreement.
