Need to step up India-Thailand trade: Nath

New Delhi, Apr 11 (UNI) India and Thailand today underlined the need for stepping up the level of two way trade placed at around 2.2 billion dollars in 2005-06, which includes India's exports worth one billion dollars to Thailand.

India's exports to Thailand registered a growth of almost 20 per cent over the previous year, with imports up by about 39 per cent at 1.2 billion dollars.

Union Commerce and Industry Minister Kamal Nath stated this after a meeting with his counterpart from Thailand Krirkkrai Jirapaet here today.

While several major Indian companies have invested in Thailand, in the post-liberalisation era, Thailand too emerged as an important investor in India with foreign direct investment (FDI) inflows of about 77.6 million dollars from August 1991 to December 2006.

Thailand now ranks as the 27th largest investor in India and the 3rd largest from the ASEAN region, after Singapore and Malaysia.

There is a Framework Agreement for establishing a Free Trade Area (FTA) between India and Thailand which was signed by the two governments in October 2003 in Bangkok, covering goods, services and investment and areas of cooperation.

The agreement also provides for a Early Harvest Scheme (EHS) under which common items of export interest to the sides have been agreed for elimination of tariffs on a fast track basis.

The tariff concessions on 82 items of EHS list have been implemented with effect from September one, 2004 with the signing of the protocol between India and Thailand in August 2004 in New Delhi.

India Thailand Trade Negotiating Committee (TNC) has been constituted to carry forward the programme of negotiations as per the Framework Agreement. Nine meetings of the TNC have been held so far. During these meetings, discussions are being held on the texts of the agreement on trade in goods, services and investment and also on the Rules of Origin for the FTA.

UNI