US frustrated with lack of balance in trade ties with India: US top official

Washington, July 12

Reiterating that President Donald Trump and US Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer are frustrated with the lack of balance and reciprocity from India when it comes to trade and tariff, a top Administration official has said that the new round of discussion between the two countries is not open-ended and the US wants things to move quickly.

“The President and the ambassador Lighthizer have been frustrated with the lack of balance and reciprocity in the trade relationship. I think, we are at a pivotal juncture here in our relationship and at a critical intersection between a frustrating last few years that we’ve had and a possible future relationship that at this point is not really defined and is still being tested,” Jeffrey D Gerrish, Deputy United States Trade Representative, said.

Gerrish’s comment on India-US trade relationship came during a fire-side chat at the Second Leadership Summit of US India Strategic and Partnership Forum (USISPF), as a team of US trade officials started talks with their Indian counterparts on trade related issues in New Delhi.

“There are a number of important issues that we have between us. We certainly have a number of important issues we were working on as part of the GSP review we had. But we need to move beyond the GSP review at this point and tackle the broader issues that we have between us and take a more comprehensive approach to the trade issues that we have,” he said.

Lighthizer has made that clear to the new Union Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal, he said. The two leaders have had a good discussion on that thus far.

“And we are hopeful that they will continue to have meaningful, important, productive discussions,” he said in response to a question. 

Listing out some of the issues between the two countries, Gerrish called for addressing the trade and tariff issues between the two countries in a comprehensive manner.

“I think it is important now that we do try to address comprehensively the trade issues that we have between us,” he said.

Among the issues are market access, and those related to agricultural and non-agricultural products, and other critical issues in areas involving digital trade, services and intellectual property protection and enforcement. PTI