India Canada Trade Relations: There are signs of improvement in trade relations between India and Canada. PM Narendra Modi and Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney met at the G20 summit in Johannesburg, South Africa. The Indian government said on Sunday that Canada and India have agreed to talk about a new trade agreement.

Due to diplomatic dispute between the two countries, talks have been stopped for the last 2 years. Bilateral talks between the Prime Ministers of both the countries also took place during the G20 summit. It has been informed by the Prime Minister’s Office of India that an agreement has been reached between the two leaders to negotiate a highly-ambitious Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA). The objective of which is to double bilateral trade by the year 2030.

Prime Minister Mark Carney’s statement

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney has written on social media platform X regarding this meeting that, met PM Narendra Modi today at the G20 summit and started talks on trade agreement.

He said that trade between the two countries can double to more than 70 billion US dollars. He further wrote that India is the 5th largest economy in the world. In such a situation, this trade agreement will create new opportunities for Canada.

What is the dispute between the two countries?

The Indian government was accused by Ottawa of being involved in the killing of a Sikh separatist from Canada. Since then the distance between the two countries had increased. A decision was taken by Canada to stop negotiations on a major trade agreement in 2023.

However, despite this dispute, trade between the two countries has increased. If we talk about figures, in 2024 the trade in goods and services was about 31 billion Canadian dollars.

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India Canada FTA Talks: Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal has said that all possibilities are being considered regarding resumption of talks on Free Trade Agreement (FTA) with Canada. The Commerce Minister said that he has had two rounds of discussions with Canada’s Export Promotion, International Trade and Economic Development Minister Maninder Sidhu and both are considering ways to strengthen bilateral cooperation and strategic partnership.

All possibilities are open: Piyush Goyal

Goyal said, “All possibilities are open.” We have had two rounds of discussions so far. We met for a high ministerial level meeting in Delhi. We discussed strengthening bilateral cooperation and strategic partnership.” Canadian Minister Sidhu had come to participate in the 30th Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) Partnership Summit held in Visakhapatnam.

Goyal said at the summit that India is ready to play a leadership role in taking forward World Trade Organization (WTO) reforms, but he stressed that the shape of these reforms should be prepared in consultation with developing and underdeveloped countries.

Giving further information, Goyal said that it should be ensured that the entire exercise is for global welfare rather than the agenda of some advanced countries. Goyal said that the world recognizes India’s strength and leadership and the country is a responsible global nation and will continue to be the voice of the Global South. “We would like to lead reforms (in the WTO),” he said. But these reforms will be done in consultation with other developing and less developed countries, so that we can actually work for the welfare of the world and not just for the agenda of a few developed countries.

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