13 mn euro TIDP between India and EU launched

New Delhi, May 25 (UNI) In what is seen as a major boost for India's bilateral trade with the European Union (EU), the visiting European Commission (EC) delegation today launched the 13.350 million euro, EU-India Trade and Investment Development Programme (TIDP).

TIDP has been launched as a joint programme of the Department of Commerce, Ministry of Commerce and Industry and the European Union.

This was announced by EC Delegation Head of Operations Etienne Claeye at a workshop organised by Overall Technical Assistance Team (OTAD) of the EU, in co-operation with the Confederation of the Food Trade and Industry of the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI).

The workshop discussed the overall scope of the TIDP, with particular focus on the programme component dealing with augmenting export of food and agricultural products from India to the EU.

A number of leading exporters of food and agricultural products from India and EU participated in the workshop.

The TIDP seeks to address some of the major obstacles to the trade and investment between the EU and India.

The export of food and agricultural products to the EU are constrained by the often-repeated EU objection of these products not conforming to the sanitary and phytosanitary measures prescribed by the EU.

The programme also seeks to strengthen the food testing laboratories of the EIC at Kolkata, Mumbai, Chennai, Cochin, Kollam, Porbandar and Veraval at a total investment of three million euros.

Besides this, 2.74 million euros will be spent in exposing the private sector to the best practices in the EU through study tours and training within and outside the country.

To meet the claim of many foreign investors about the lack of IPR protection in India, the programme will trains the IPO officials and highlight the various aspects of IPR to various segments of the economy.

Training of the customs officials in the best practices is another key objective. These measures are expected to further strengthen the confidence of foreign investors in India.

The TIDP has accordingly been designed to focus on providing technical assistance and exchanging information and experience in the areas of Sanitary and Phytosanitary (SPS) Measures, Intellectual Property Rights (IPR), Trade and Investment Facilitation and Customs Practices.

The TIDP is expected to be completed before December 31 2007.

TIDP Chief Programme Co-ordinator, Dr D Kebschull spoke of the great potential for the export of tea, spices, vegetables and tropical fruits from India to the EU and said, TIDP would be actively engaged in removing the bottlenecks to trade in merchandise goods and services as also to give a fillip to India's export of agricultural products and promote safe and environment friendly production.

EmphasiSing the importance of trade with the EU he said, the one million euros additional exports from India would translate into 2000 new jobs and support the livelihood of 10, 000 people in this country.

EU-India TIDP Advisor A Sahasranaman said, the objectives of TIDP were to assist India in building an economic environment to enhance its trade and investment performance with the EU, in particular, upgrading the regulatory infrastructure and inspection system to meet WTO/EU requirements, enhancing training and capacity building on multilateral trade and investment aspects and facilitating FDI.

UNI MP ARP DB1817