Where do you see India-US trade relations going from here, especially on friendshoring and getting US companies to invest in India?
Minister (Piyush) Goyal and I held our first trade policy forum (TPF) in November 2021. The TPF hadn’t convened since 2017 and it had broken down then and there was not even a joint statement between the US and India. It’s maybe a marker in terms of a relationship that has been marked by tremendous potential, but also as significant underperformance of that potential. The joint statement was 5-6 pages long and included references to discussions on topics that have traditionally been challenging between the US and India. So I considered that to be a significant win. In January, we had our second TPF and made market access and some market relaxation commitments to each other. So that was taking the relationship forward another notch. A couple of weeks ago, when Prime Minister Narendra Modi came to Washington for a state visit, we challenged ourselves to do even more and that’s when we buried the hatchet on six of our seven outstanding WTO disputes.
So at this point, our trade relationship within the context of the larger relationship, is mirroring the dynamism and the upward trajectory that I see just over the course of a couple of days visiting Jaipur and Delhi (for G20). It is an incredible sense of optimism and forward-looking vantage point. We are challenging ourselves on what our next steps are going to be. Each one of these sets of outcomes creates a stair step forward and upwards. At this point, what we’re able to accomplish is only limited by our own creativity and our own sense of what’s possible.
On friendshoring, there is a lot in common that I see between President Biden’s and PM Modi’s vision on economic agendas for their countries. It is about investing in ourselves, empowering our people, workers, small businesses and small family farmers.
What about the WTO poultry dispute?
We are working on it. We continue to talk about it. If you know minister Goyal, you can imagine that he will be interested as I am, in completely clearing the slate, but we continue to have our technical teams working on it. Did you take up with the minister the issue of India putting restrictions on import of personal computers, laptops and tablets?
Yes. We expressed our concerns around the substance but also in terms of the process.
Contrary to the process around the development of the Data Protection Act, where there was a lot of opportunity for stakeholders to engage, this one was quite sudden and I reflected to the minister that we see that with respect to the Data Act, there has been a tremendous sense of confidence in not just the outcome, but also the process… Should concerns arise in the next stages, there will be opportunity to engage and in the case of these import licensing requirements, (we) wanted minister Goyal to know that that engagement is really critical to partnership, but also to advancing a commercial environment that fosters the kind of confidence that businesses and investors like.
Did you get any kind of assurance?
We had a very good conversation and I was assured by Goyal’s receptiveness to the points that I made and the desire to remain engaged.
What kind of outcomes can we expect from the G20 summit under India’s presidency in the backdrop of geopolitical developments?
In terms of these past couple of years, these forums are institutions that are important. About geopolitical complexities, and I’ll just call it out, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, many of our institutions that reflect a really important diversity of membership have had to contend with these challenges directly.
In terms of India’s presidency, from what I’ve seen so far through the trade track, I have only the most positive reflections on the leadership that minister Goyal and his team have demonstrated in managing challenging circumstances very successfully.
Is there any indication from India that it now wants to join the trade pillar of the Indo Pacific Economic Framework? Are we looking at the November deadline?
It is so important for India to be a part of this framework. India is actively participating in pillars 2, 3 and 4. It is still engaged on pillar 1, although not an active participant. We’re delighted to continue to engage with India on Pillar 1 and open to continuing to explore where and when India’s interests might align with ours.
What outcomes does the US expect from WTO ministerial conference (MC13)?
My MC13 list is quite long. In 2017, it was a no outcome ministerial, and rough and quite demoralising for the WTO membership. So in 2022, we had a really robust package of outcomes, more than anyone expected. I want to give Goyal a lot of credit. His leadership of India’s participation was a critical part to our success and we worked closely through that. For MC13, now that we’ve had two more years of relationship building, communication, and enhancing our understanding of each other, I’m even more bullish. We are keen for MC13 to be the first of our reform ministerials.
Do these reforms mean the dispute settlement body only, or something else too?
Well, it’s the reform of the entire institution. The institution is almost 30 years old. Since 1995, so much has changed. A lot of us in all our different policy lanes are really focused on how to address the climate crisis-how to mitigate, adapt and change our economic incentives and turbocharge the innovation that’s going to be required. The negotiations that happened through the 1980s that concluded in 1994 and 1995, the WTO agreements do not anticipate this movement- the digital transformation as well the need for more resilient supply chains. The membership has expanded and the members have themselves experienced significant economic changes.
The dispute settlement system undoubtedly is a piece of the reform agenda, but we also need to be looking at the other functions of the WTO. There is the negotiating function which at MC12, was a really important way to kick start to give us confidence that WTO members can still come together to agree to things. Also the daily monitoring and functioning of the WTO that happens in all the committees, that there are opportunities to reform the entire institution is so important.
We’re not responsible stakeholders and members of this organisation if we are not constantly struggling to adapt it to be responsive to our needs as we and the global economy evolve.
Did you also discuss supply chain resilience with your Indian counterpart? Do you see India getting some part of investment?
One of the first things we need to do is map out our economies, where our strengths and needs are. We need to look at what are the policy tools we should deploy – the existing ones; do we need to adapt to new ones or take all tools and use them in new ways to create the incentives for the businesses that make the supply chain resilient. Given the size of India and the US, there could be interesting ways to explore the synergies and develop supply chains in complementary ways.