India FTA with Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) on the Anvil

India and the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) have agreed to pursue a free trade agreement (FTA) and resume the negotiations, commerce and industry minister Piyush Goyal said on Thursday, 24 Nov. 2022.

GCC is a union of six countries — Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Qatar, Kuwait, Oman and Bahrain. The council is the largest trading bloc of India. India’s exports to the GCC member countries grew by over 58% to about $44 billion in 2021-22 against nearly $28 billion in 2020-21, according to commerce ministry data.

Bilateral trade in goods has increased to $155 billion in 2021-22 from $87billion in 2020-21. Services trade between the two regions was valued at around $14 billion in 2021-22, with exports aggregated at $5. 5 billion and imports at $8. 3 billion.

“We have agreed to pursue the FTA between GCC and India, resume the negotiations and conclude the same at the earliest,” Goyal told reporters here in a joint press conference with GCC secretary general Nayef Falah M Al-Hajraf here. GCC countries contribute almost 35% of India’s oil imports and 70% of its gas imports.

India’s overall crude oil imports from the GCC in 2021-22 were about $48 billion, while LNG and LPG imports in 2021-22 stood at about $21 billion.