India-UAE explore mechanism to trade in national Currencies :
Union Commerce and Industry minister Piyush Goyal and Member of the executive council of the emirates of Abu dhabi Sheikh Hamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan on Tuesday co-chaired the 10th meeting of the UAE-India high level joint task force on investment. The 10th meeting of UAE-India high level joint task force on investment was held in Mumbai.
The joint task force was established in 2013 to promote trade, investment and economics ties between the UAE and India.
This was the first time meeting of the joint task force since the signing of the India-UAE comprehensive economic partnership agreement and unveiling of the joint UAE-India vision statement in February 2022 .
The CEPA is a major trade agreement set to transform bilateral economic, trade and Investment ties and propel economic growth. Both these historic landmarks provide a clear road map for continued strengthening of the two countries at an accelerate pace.
In a meeting Shri Piyush Goyal said India-UAE witnessing unprecedented momentum, large number of opportunities for cooperation exist in key sectors like infrastructure and technology.
India, UAE decide to explore establishment of efficient and integrated single window solution and virtual trade corridors to reduce time and cost in trade . India fast track mechanism to be set up in UAE to resolve issues faced by Indian businesses and investors in UAE.
An important area discussed was the creation of a mechanism for carrying out bilateral trade in national currencies.
Refereeing to the ongoing discussions between RBI and central bank of the United Arab Emirate on unified payment interface (UPI) as a common digital payments platform, both sides agreed to continue discussion.
As per economic times UAE expect trade with India to cross USD 100 Billion in coming 2-3 years.
As minister of UAE shared some details about trade between India and UAE. The Indo-UAE trade stood at USD 73 billion in FY22, which got a major fillip since the two nations signed the comprehensive economic partnership agreement (CEPA) on MAY 1, 2022 .
Between FY21 and FY22 the overall trade rose 68% to USD 73 Billion, after declining for two years. But the trend has revised since the signing of CEPA.
The minister said trade is still dominated by oil, which constitutes 62% of the overall trade value and only 38% are non-oil trade now.
The minister also said while non-oil trade balance is still in favor of India by a whisker, overall India has trade deficit of USD 17 billion in FY22, let vastly by large oil imports. The UAE minister also said, his country’s cumulative investment in India is over USD 20 Billion, of which USD 14.4 billion are FDI, making the UAE the eighth largest FDI source for India. In April-June this year, FDI flows into the country from the UAE stood at USD 2.14 billion.
India-UAE relations are witnessing an unprecedented monetum with large number of opportunities for cooperation and increasing investments.