(Image source from: timesofindia.indiatimes.com)

With the ongoing discussions about the possible trade disputes around, Piyush Goyal said that there aren’t any major conflicts and just a few disagreements. In an issued statement on 15th October, 2019, Tuesday, the Commerce minister clarified stating that both the nations don’t necessarily have any trade disputes and do have bilateral trade and investment options available.

In one of the ministerial panel conducted at the India Energy Forum, Goyal said that there are no trade disputes with the United States. He said that its true that they do have disagreements but he doesn’t know of any relation that doesn’t have disagreements, or “nok jhok” as he likes to call it. According to him, a little of the uncertainty does help in taking things forward which is quite beneficial.

The comment made by Goyal does have significance with accordance to the recent withdrawal of the Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) or the common trade tariffs in specific of the Indian products by the United States. This is pivotal in this state because both of the nations are currently working on settling their trade agreements.

Goyal has a firm belief that his discussion with the allied US counterpart is definitely going to help improve the bilateral relations even further.

Following the GSP withdrawal, Goyal issued a statement saying, “It could be a dispute in the eyes of some, but I think it opened up an opportunity for me to have a dialogue with my colleague (US trade representative). We had some wonderful discussions.”

He further focused on his discussions with the US Energy firms and stating saying, “There is huge potential on the gas side and also in nuclear energy. The US and India have a robust relationship, which has huge potential going forward... We should not look at incremental growth in our relationship. We should be looking at a quantum leap. We have set half-trillion-dollar (trade) target (with the US)."

Goyal believes that there is a very huge potential in terms of the energy exports from the United States to India. He also said that there has been consistent business going on with US on oil, gas as well as the nuclear fronts.

If the total trade relations are to be considered for the year of 2018-19, he said that the overall trade amounts to around USD 88 billion.

By Somapika Dutta