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By Shruti Srivastava
India has launched an online platform to help its exporters reach US buyers, as it steps up efforts to boost bilateral trade to $500 billion by the end of the decade.
The move comes as India and the US continue negotiations on a trade deal, whose broad contours were agreed earlier this year. The US remains a crucial market for Indian exporters despite President Donald Trump’s punitive tariffs and New Delhi’s efforts to diversify its overseas markets. Exporters have been looking for new destinations to reduce their dependence on the US, but its share of India’s exports has remained largely unchanged.
“Exporters of goods and services will be able to connect with American buyers, including large retailers” such as Amazon Inc., Walmart Inc. and Costco Wholesale Corp., through the trade portal, Binaya S. Pradhan, India’s Consul General in New York, said in an interview. The platform is aimed at helping India’s small-and-medium-sized businesses and first-time exporters gain access to the US market, he said.
An analysis of trade ministry data for the 12 months through July showed the US accounted for about 20% of India’s exports, highlighting the difficulty of replacing demand from the world’s largest economy.
The two countries set a target of more than doubling bilateral trade to $500 billion by 2030 during Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s meeting with Trump last year. India and US traded nearly $141 billion of goods and services for the year to March, according to data from the Indian Commerce Ministry.
Modi was among the first foreign leaders to meet Trump after his return to the White House, and both leaders have emphasised their warm personal ties. But relations between the two countries have faced repeated strains over the past year, including disputes over tariffs, India’s purchases of Russian oil and Trump’s claims that he brokered peace between India and Pakistan.
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