Biz urges US officials to push for friendlier environment in India

More than a dozen business groups on Monday urged U.S. trade officials to push for a better trade and investment environment in India. 

U.S. and Indian officials will meet on Tuesday in New Delhi to address longstanding bilateral trade problems and new barriers imposed by  Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government. 

{mosads}In a letter, the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) along with 15 other business groups pressed U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman to address a slew of trade concerns during the the U.S.–India Trade Policy Forum. 

“The Trade Policy Forum is a critical opportunity for concrete action to level the playing field for U.S. products and exports in India,” said Linda Dempsey, NAM’s vice president of international economic affairs.

“While India’s new government has talked of opening its market for business, we have yet to see real results on a wide range of barriers.”

The groups say that the Indian government has recently raised tariffs, implemented forced localization requirements that are blocking U.S. exports of a wide range of products and imposed new testing requirements on telecommunications products.

For the forum “to be meaningful, however, it must ultimately lead to concrete steps to improve the environment for businesses in the United States that are exporting to and operating in India,” the groups, part of the Alliance for Fair Trade with India, wrote to Froman. 

The Trade Policy Forum, which was created in 2005, is being revived after four years of no action. 

“We will be responsible, influential world powers together only when both governments, through their actions, treat each other’s exports and products fairly,” the groups wrote.

In a speech in New Delhi on Monday, Froman said that “the most important factor determining the future evolution of our bilateral economic relationship is the quality of the business environment based on transparency, consistency, predictability.”

Froman said that the United States is cautiously optimistic about the future of the long-standing bilateral relationship.

“The future of our partnership remains, as it has always been, ours to define,” Froman said.

“Now, the responsibility falls on each of us, whether in government, business or the nonprofit sector, to build on the recent momentum,” he said at the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry.

“We must set our sights on the big, yet achievable accomplishments within our reach. Forward together, we must go further.”

The two nations recently announced a breakthrough, hailed by business groups, on a Trade Facilitation Agreement during President Obama’s trip to Asia. 

That deal is expected to be finalized in early December in Geneva. It will streamline customs rules to move goods more efficiently across borders.

Obama is slated to travel to India in January to participate in a ceremony marking the nation’s anniversary of the adoption of its constitution.