India’s ongoing trade negotiations with the European Union and the United States are unlikely to deliver easy gains, according to development economist Dr Biswajit Dhar, who argues that structural weaknesses in Indian manufacturing, agriculture and regulatory standards could complicate the country’s ambitions for greater market access.
In an interview on The Gist on StratNews Global, Dhar, who’s been a professor at Delhi’s Jawaharlal Nehru University and Director General of the Research and Information System For Developing Countries (RIS), said recent European Union sanctions targeting certain India-based entities allegedly linked to Russia’s military-industrial ecosystem are unlikely to derail the India-EU Free Trade Agreement (FTA). He noted that similar sanctions have been issued periodically and should not be viewed as a major obstacle to the deal’s conclusion.
However, Dhar pointed to what he described as a degree of double standards in Europe’s approach. While the EU has criticised countries linked to Russian supply chains, it has itself remained heavily dependent on imported energy and has merely shifted sourcing patterns as market conditions evolved.
On the India-EU trade pact, Dhar cautioned that tariff reductions alone will not guarantee export growth. The bigger challenge, he argued, lies in Europe’s extensive network of product, environmental, labour and food-safety standards.
“The game in international trade has moved from tariffs to non-tariff measures,” he said, adding that compliance requires significant investment, technological upgrading and stronger regulatory systems.
He cited recent concerns over Indian agricultural exports, including reports of mango shipments being flagged abroad, as evidence of persistent quality-control challenges. European food-safety requirements, he noted, remain non-negotiable.
Turning to negotiations with Washington, Dhar identified agricultural market access as the principal sticking point. US President Donald Trump, he said, remains strongly backed by American agribusiness interests and is likely to push aggressively for access to India’s protected farm sector.
At the same time, Washington continues to press India on intellectual property protections, labour standards and trade imbalances. Dhar expressed scepticism about the long-term reliability of any agreement reached with the current US administration, arguing that businesses require predictable and transparent rules while US trade policy increasingly appears subject to political pressure and changing priorities.
More fundamentally, Dhar believes India enters most trade negotiations from a position of weakness. He noted that trade deficits have widened after many of India’s major FTAs because domestic producers have struggled to take advantage of new export opportunities.
India’s manufacturing share of GDP, he observed, has fallen rather than risen over the past decade, while quality and standards compliance remain persistent concerns.
Unless regulators, businesses and consumers collectively demand higher standards, Dhar argued, India will continue to face difficulties translating market-opening agreements into export success.
For more fascinating insights into India’s challenges with global trade from an expert, watch the full interview.
