India’s Ministry of Steel is pushing for inclusion of steel in a ‘negative list’ at the forthcoming interministerial meeting to negotiate a free trade agreement under the aegis of Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), which gets underway in Manila, on September 10, a government official said on Friday. If a product is on the negative list import of that product can be banned or import duty concessions agreed in the free trade agreement will not be applicable for the said product.
He said that the Indian trade delegation will be led by the newly appointed Minister of Commerce, Suresh Prabhu and the Ministry of Steel has communicated to the Commerce Ministry that the delegation in course of negotiating a trade deal should steadfastly maintain need for import tariff protection for steel against the backdrop of large investments in steel production planned by India.
The free trade agreement of RCEP involves the 10 ASEAN countries and six others including India, China, Japan, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand.
In its recommendations to the Ministry of Commerce on a negative list, the Ministry of Steel pointed out that India’s free trade agreement with Japan and South Korea had already opened floodgates of steel imports at ‘near zero’ import duty and further opening up of the steel sector under a new trade deal will be detrimental to investments and growth of the domestic steel companies.
According to the Ministry of Steel, with the Indian government already laying out a policy document for achieving 300 million ton per year of domestic steel production by 2030, import protection is imperative to achieve this, the official added.