India and the European Union (EU) are maximising efforts to finalise the negotiations on their Free Trade Agreement (FTA) by the end of this year, the EU trade commissioner Maros Sefcovic said Friday as both sides wrapped up 13th round of negotiations.
“We will not agree on everything but as major democracies in an increasingly uncertain world there are a lot of areas where we can work together. I am sure we will achieve a very good agreement,” he said at the annual session of Automotive Component Manufacturers’ Association. “Seeing the goodwill, political courage and constructive attitudes for negotiations we will meet our deadline,” he added.
The deadline was set in February by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and Prime Minister Narendra Modi when the entire college of commissioners of the EU had visited India. The 13th round of talks for the agreement started on Monday and ended on Friday.
“We are looking forward to a very robust, fair, equitable, balanced, win-win partnership in terms of an enduring FTA. Every agreement has some give and take to make it a balanced agreement. There can never be a perfect situation and you will agree you should not make perfect the enemy of the good,” commerce and industry minister Piyush Goyal said at the same event after Sefcovic spoke.
He said through the agreement the EU will benefit from India’s growth story and India will benefit from the size of the EU economy, their technologies and innovations.
As the negotiators from both sides grappled with the details of the agreement, EU trade commissioner and the commissioner in charge of agriculture Christophe Hansen arrived in New Delhi on Thursday to give a thrust to the negotiations.
Earlier Goyal had said that India and EU will conclude their FTA negotiations “quite substantially” by the end of the 13th round. He had also said that both sides have finalised 60-65% of the chapters of the FTA.
Addressing key trade issues and challenges
The India-EU FTA negotiations re-started in June 2022. The FTA covers 23 policy areas or chapters, including Trade in Goods, Trade in Services, Investment, Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures, Technical Barriers to Trade, Trade Remedies, Rules of Origin, Customs and Trade Facilitation, Competition, Trade Defence, Government Procurement, Dispute Settlement, Intellectual Property Rights, Geographical Indications, and Sustainable Development.
Importance of the agreement for both sides
The FTA is crucial as the 27-member bloc is the biggest trading partner of India with bilateral merchandise trade at $ 136.2 billion, though the US remains the biggest market. Exports from India stood at $ 75.8 billion while imports were $ 60.6 billion in 2024-25. Both sides also have a very robust services trade too which stood at $ 70 billion in 2023. India has a surplus of $ 9.25 billion.
Through this agreement India is seeking preferential access to its labour intensive exports like textiles and apparel, leather and other products like machinery, chemicals, pharma and metals. It is also seeking relaxation of visa norms for temporary workers for smoother delivery of services.
India is also seeking a carve out for its steel and aluminium exports from the carbon tax imposed through Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM). The tax will be collected from January next year. Its trade agreement with the US, the EU has granted this exemption for American exports of the products covered by CBAM.
The EU is seeking greater opening of the Indian market for its auto sector, wines and spirits, agriculture products like meat and poultry.