The proposed India-European Union (EU) free trade agreement (FTA) would benefit domestic exporters as the EU is one of the biggest traditional markets for the country, according to the Trade Promotion Council of India (TPCI), which recently said issues like movement of professionals, duty cut on goods like alcoholic beverages, automobiles and dairy products may see tough negotiations.

The council had organised a panel discussion on India-EU trade relations.

"Industry is upbeat with hope and optimism over India - EU ensuing trade pact," TPCI said in a statement.

Experts hailed the decision to resume talks for the agreement between India and the EU is positive, a news agency reported. Arpita Mukherjee, professor at the Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations (ICRIER), proposed innovative ways of tariff liberalisation and said India needs to deeply study EU-Vietnam and EU-MERCOSUR agreements to see what these partners gave to the EU and got in return.

Rupa Chanda, Reserve Bank of India chair professor in economics, said India retains its unique advantages for trade partners as its large market and human resource base, role in pharma production, manufacturing and emerging startup ecosystem are quite unparalleled.

In 2020, India''s export to EU was $8.43 billion, while imports stood at $33.4 billion.

Fibre2Fashion News Desk (DS)

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