India and Vietnam pledge to boost bilateral trade, economic cooperation

livemint.com:

New Delhi: With an aim to deepen bilateral trade and economic ties, India and Vietnam on Tuesday convened the 5th meeting of the India-Vietnam Joint Trade Sub-Commission (JTSC) , the ministry of commerce & industry said. This meeting was held after a gap of more than four years on account of the covid-19 pandemic and other factors.

The meeting was co-chaired by the additional secretary, Department of Commerce, Ministry of Commerce & Industry, Rajesh Agrawal from the Indian side and Deputy Minister, Ministry of Industry and Trade, Phan Thi Thang from the Vietnam side. According to the ministry, both sides reviewed the progress on bilateral trade and economic cooperation and discussed ways to unlock the vast untapped potential in bilateral trade to enable the business communities from the two sides to benefit from the partnership of two of the fastest growing economies.

“Both sides identified potential sectors such as agriculture, fisheries, textiles, footwear, pharmaceuticals, chemicals, fertilizers, machinery and equipment, consumer products, energy and automobile industry, for expanding trade cooperation and agreed to work together to resolve market access issues and technical barriers faced by the exporters through regular and sustained bilateral discussions," it added. The Indian side raised the issues of pending registration of Indian fishery and meat establishments for export, restricted market access in public procurement of drugs for Indian pharmaceutical companies and high anti-dumping duties imposed on Indian polyster filament yarn products and sorbitol.