External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar and First Deputy Prime Minister of Russia Denis Manturov at the 25th session of the bilateral IGC, in New Delhi on November 12, 2024
| Photo Credit: PTI
There have been challenges to trade, especially in regard to payments and logistics, however perceptible progress has been made in that regard, External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar said on Tuesday (November 12, 2024) while stating that there was still some work to be done.
Russian First Deputy Prime Minister Denis Manturov noted that in the last five years, the trade turnover has grown more than fivefold and India is now the second country among all the foreign economic partners of Russia.
“Our joint endeavours in regard to connectivity, such as the International North-South Transport Corridor, the Chennai-Vladivostok Corridor and the Northern Sea Route must go forward. We will also be discussing cooperation critical for our food, energy and health security. Russia has emerged as a major source of fertilizers for us. Its supply of crude oil, coal and uranium are indeed important. Similarly, India’s pharmaceutical industry has emerged as an affordable and reliable source for Russia…,” Dr. Jaishankar said. He said this in the opening remarks of the 25th session of India-Russia inter-governmental commission on trade, Economic, scientific, technological and cultural cooperation which Mr. Jaishankar co-chaired along with Mr. Manturov.
“I am confident that we will achieve the trade target of $100 billion by 2030, well before that,” Mr. Jaishankar said while noting that the growth in bilateral trade to $66 billion has been “impressive” and needs to be more balanced and more facilitative for easier trade.
Since the war in Ukraine and Russia ouster from the international SWIFT payment system, payments have emerged as a major bottleneck between the two countries, even as India’s oil imports from Russia increased manifold. Both sides have been trying to increase the Rupee-Rubble trade and have also created Vostro accounts to encourage businesses to trade in local currencies.
“Our deliberations covered the complimentary and beneficial India-Russia economic and trade cooperation, reinforcing critical food, energy & health security and facilitating mobility of talent and skills,” Mr. Jaishankar said later on social media platform, X. Confident that our deliberations today will make a strong contribution to the direction and progress of our strategic partnership, he added.
Mr. Manturov said they are committed among other things, to the signing of the Free Trade Agreement between the EEU and India, as well as the bilateral agreement on services and investments. This fully meets the needs of our business community, he stated.
He said they are working to expand relations between Russian and Indian banks. “We’re interested in expanding direct air traffic between our countries,” he said noting that currently flights are operated solely by the Russian Airlines Aeroflot, conducting 12 regular flights per week from Moscow and Yekaterinburg to Delhi and Goa. We hope to see more frequent flights development of the route network as well as the resumption of flights by Indian air carriers, he stated.
On the civil nuclear cooperation, an important pillar of cooperation between the two countries, Mr. Manturov said they are interested in expanding complex cooperation in the nuclear field, including the successful results of realising the project of Kudankulam Nuclear Power Plant. We’re conducting work on creating joint production of high-speed electric trains for Indian railways within the initiative Make in India, he added.
Published – November 12, 2024 10:41 pm IST
