India Expands Industrial Cooperation with the Eurasian Economic Union

September 7, 2023 Posted by India Briefing Written by Chris Devonshire-Ellis Reading Time: 2 minutes

India and the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU) are developing an industrial cooperation plan, fostering alignment across various sectors. This industrial alignment road map is a precursor to a potential Free Trade Agreement.

India and the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU) are developing a detailed industrial cooperation plan that will shortly be published, according to Nikolay Rogozhnik, Deputy Director of the EAEU Industrial Policy Department, and Ved Prakash Singh, First Secretary of the Head of the Economic and Commercial Division of the Embassy of India in Russia. The development is significant as India is negotiating a Free Trade Agreement with the EAEU.

Rogozhnik stated that “In order to create conditions for the transition to project-based industrial cooperation, we have prepared a draft roadmap for cooperation between the Commission and authorised bodies of India, containing a number of promising areas of sectoral industrial cooperation.”

Russia and India have discussed a number of issues concerning interaction and expansion in industrial cooperation, holding joint exhibitions, thematic forums, exchange of experience, including within specific technologies and businesses. This development underlines the efforts both are making to align their industrial sectors to mutual advantage.

These include the implementation of joint projects in the chemical and pharmaceutical industries, metallurgy, aircraft construction, automotive industry, mining, as well as in the production of medical equipment and materials, biological preparations, clothing, footwear, special steel, copper cable, information technology, including the creation of technoparks for the production of IT-industry products, hydrogen energy, diamond processing, and construction.

Rogozhnik adds that the roadmap will include promising areas and industries for future cooperation between the EAEU (Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Russia) and India. The document also contains details concerning technology exchange, personnel training, analytical and statistical data, as well as proposals for mutual visits to each other’s facilities by leading industrial and scientific enterprises of the EAEU and India.

Rogozhnik and Singh have passed the draft industrial cooperation roadmap for consideration by the Government of India. Agreements have been reached that for the effective implementation of all the plans outlined it is necessary to build a direct dialogue between the EAEU with Industrial and Government representatives in India. It can be expected that this subject will be discussed on the sides of next week’s G20 summit in New Delhi, which Russia’s Foreign Minister, Sergey Lavrov, will be attending.