Press Information Bureau

Government of India

Ministry of Commerce & Industry

01-November-2012 17:25 IST

The Union Minister of Commerce Industry and Textiles Shri Anand Sharma has said that India and Germany will achieve the trade target of Euro 20 billion (USD 26.16 billion) this year. The trade between the two countries stood at USD 23.566 in 2011. “India and Germany have set a trade target of Euro 20 billion (US$ 26.16 billion) to be achieved by 2012 and I am sure that we will be able to reach this target if not cross it with efforts from both sides,” said Shri Sharma after the meeting with Dr. Phillipp Roesler, Minister of Economic and Technology and Vice Chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany, here today.

Both the leaders also reviewed the progress of India EU BTIA and expressed the desire that it a balanced and ambitious agreement be reached soon. The Chief negotiators are meeting in Brussels on 8th November and a delegation is coming to this month to pursue the issue of declaring India Data Secure which is an important demand from Indian side. "We have proposed the principal of incremental approach so that what may not happen now can be included later. But what we have on the table from both the sides, it is fairly robust. We will now leave it to negotiators to bring it to its early conclusion .... We will have a ministerial scheduled either for December or January, depends on how fast they (Chief Negotiators) work. That time, hopefully, we will announce the conclusion of the negotiations," Minister Sharma told reporters after the meeting.

Dr Roseler underlined the concerns of their Pharmaceutical industry in the wake of granting of compulsory licence of a cancer medicine to Natco recently. Shri Sharma assured the visiting Minister that India’s action was well within the parameters of TRIPS commitments and the flexibility of compulsory licensing has been used more than 50 times by the developed countries while this was the first time India resorted to this. He said India’s IP structure is fully compliant with its international commitments.

In 2011 Indian export to Germany stood at USD 8.25 billion and import were USD 15.31 billion. FDI inflows from Germany into India is around US$ 4.9 billion and it ranks 8th among investors in India. FDI flow from India into Germany is US $ 5.9 billion in 2011.

The German Minister is participating in 13th Asia-Pacific Conference of German Business which is being held in Gurgaon during 1-3 November, 2012.

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Compulsory licensing affirmed as TRIPS consistent, while an incremental approach steers India-EU trade negotiations toward balanced agreement. India proposed an incremental approach to the India-EU Bilateral Trade and Investment Agreement negotiations so negotiators can conclude a balanced package now and defer unresolved elements for later; concurrently India affirmed that its grant of a compulsory licence was exercised within TRIPS flexibilities and that its intellectual property framework complies with international commitments.