Iran proposes free trade agreement with India – Report
Iran has reportedly proposed a free trade agreement with India to boost bilateral trade and investment.
The matter has been raised during the recent visit of India’s Commerce Secretary Rajeev Kher to Tehran, the Press Trust of India (PTI) news agency has reported. He was there for the first meeting of the joint working group of the two countries.
"Iran has proposed to negotiate a preferential trading agreement with us. I told them that India will consider this proposal very positively and will soon respond after taking the appropriate mandate from the government," Kher has been quoted as saying by PTI.
He said the pact would be beneficial for India as through Iran, it can get market access to some parts of Europe and Africa.
Kher further indicated that lifting of trade sanctions would help Iran to increase oil imports to India.
India had cut its imports from over 18 million tonnes five years back to 11 million tonnes in 2013-14. India is one of the largest importers of crude oil from Iran, PTI added.
India and Iran agreed to increase cooperation in sectors including petroleum, petrochemicals, raw materials like gold, stones and rare earth metals, Kher said.
"Iran also has high ambition to develop its rail infra, power infra, irrigation facilities and India has strength in engineering and projects exports," Kher said, adding that India could extend buyers credit line to Iran.
"We have also offered buyers credit for Chabahar port. First phase requirement will be $150 million. Iran wants to buy rail wagons to expand its rail network," he said.
The Indian official further said Iran and India have discussed the expansion of the International North-South Corridor transit route, which is a shorter route for India to access Russian and eastern European markets.
"This route will drastically reduce transactions cost for India. To facilitate this route, India has already done a study on this. There is a need to popularize it. In June, we will organize a conference on this and will invite all the stakeholders.
"We will invite all the countries, private sector representatives from shipping and rail industry besides government officials," he said.
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