India and the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) will soon conclude a Free Trade Agreement (FTA) on services at the earliest, Union Minister of State for External Affairs Shashi Tharoor said here on Saturday.
Inaugurating an international conference on the theme ‘Asian Trade: the way forward,’ organised by Asian Development Dialogue (ADD), Dr. Tharoor said the country was also negotiating an FTA with the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) which had the potential to catapult India-Gulf relations to a higher realm.
Dr. Tharoor said though the South Asian Free Trade Agreement (SAFTA) was already in place, it had not realised its potential due to bilateral differences among two member states. His Ministry was also working on Comprehensive Economic Cooperation Agreements (CECA) with countries with whom the economic engagement was substantive. India signed its first CECA in June 2005 with Singapore and it had elevated bilateral ties between the two countries to a higher level. Encouraged by the success of the first CECA, India had signed a CECA with South Korea in August 2009. The treaty included trade in goods and services as well as investments. It also dealt with competition and intellectual property rights.
“India is the only country so far to obtain a commitment for temporary migration of professional workers under Mode 4 of WTO rules. South Korea has not offered such a commitment in any other bilateral agreement. The agreement is also expected to encourage South Korean auto firms to invest more in India. We are in the process of negotiating a CECA with Japan as well,” the Minister said.
K. P. Kannan, Professor of Development Economics, Centre for Development Studies (CDS) here, delivered the keynote address on the theme ‘Asian Development: trade and beyond’ at the conference. C. P. John, former member, State Planning Board chaired the inaugural session. G. Vijayaraghavan, founder CEO, Technopark, Thiruvananthapuram, chaired the technical session.
