White House releases fact sheet on India-US trade deal; Know key terms of agreement

Amid the uncertainties over the India-US trade which was announced by US President Donald Trump last week, the White House has released a fact sheet, addressing several concerns and sharing key agreements reached between the two countries.

According to the White House, Trump and Prime Minister Narendra Modi reached a framework for an Interim Agreement on reciprocal trade and reaffirmed their commitment to broader US-India Bilateral Trade Agreement (BTA) negotiations.

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While the deal was announced, it has still not been signed although both countries have shared some details of the interim agreement.

According to Trump and the White House, India has committed to stop purchasing the Russian oil. However, there is still no clarity on this as Russia has said that it has not received any communication regarding this from India.

The Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) has also not confirmed this and maintained that the government’s purchase of energy products will ensure the interests of 1.4 billion Indians.

However, the White House has reiterated in the fact sheet that India has indeed committed to stop buying Russian oil.

“President Trump agreed to remove the additional 25% tariff on imports from India in recognition of India’s commitment to stop purchasing Russian Federation oil. Accordingly, the President signed an Executive Order last Friday removing that additional 25% tariff,” the White House said.

Below are the key agreements of the India-US trade deal as per the White House fact sheet

• India will eliminate or reduce tariffs on all US industrial goods and a wide range of US food and agricultural products, including dried distillers’ grains (DDGs), red sorghum, tree nuts, fresh and processed fruit, certain pulses, soybean oil, wine and spirits, and additional products.
• India committed to buy more American products and purchase over $500 billion of US energy, information and communication technology, agricultural, coal, and other products.
• India will address non-tariff barriers that affect bilateral trade in priority areas.  The United States and India will negotiate rules of origin that ensure that the agreed benefits accrue predominately to the United States and India.
• India will remove its digital services taxes and committed to negotiate a robust set of bilateral digital trade rules that address discriminatory or burdensome practices and other barriers to digital trade, including rules that prohibit the imposition of customs duties on electronic transmissions.
• The United States and India committed to strengthen economic security alignment to enhance supply chain resilience and innovation through complementary actions to address non-market policies of third parties as well as cooperating on inbound and outbound investment reviews and export controls.
• The United States and India will significantly increase bilateral trade in technology products and expand joint technology cooperation.