Trade ministers and senior officials of India and China would conscious upon ways to boost two-way commerce and reduce trade deficit in the Joint Economic Group (JEG) meeting here today.
The meeting assumes significance as India has time and again raised the issue of heavy trade unevenness with China and sought steps to make easy Indian exports in areas including pharmaceutical and agricultural products and information technology services.
Commerce and Industry Minister Suresh Prabhu and his Chinese counterpart Zhong Shan will talk about "how to balance the trade gap in the India-China Joint Economic Group meeting," a government official said.
Investment related issues are also expected to come up for table- discussion besides market access matters and other non-trade barriers.
Trade shortfall with China stood at USD 36.73 billion during April-October this fiscal.
Increasing trade shortfall with China can be attributed first and foremost to the fact that Chinese exports to India rely robustly on manufactured items to meet the demand of fast expanding sectors like telecom and power.
Prabhu has recently stated that India is eager to plan upon ways to reduce the trade deficit with China.
"We will discuss that issue bilaterally," he has said.
The JEG was created in December 1988 during the visit of the then Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi to Beijing.
In 2011-12, the bilateral trade between the both countries stood at USD 75.45 billion while India's exports stood at USD 17.90 billion, imports were USD 57.55 billion.
India's trade shortfall with China has slightly dipped to USD 51 billion in 2016-17 from USD 52.69 billion in the previous fiscal.