President Xi Jinping has suggested to Prime Minister Narendra Modi that China and India should set up a new bilateral trade target of $100 billion by 2020, as Beijing is looking at importing non-Basmati rice as well as sugar to address the huge trade deficit.
PM Modi had detailed discussions with President Xi on bilateral and global issues on the sidelines Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit on Saturday.
Addressing a press briefing after the Modi-Xi meeting, the second in nearly six weeks, Foreign Secretary Vijay Gokhale said that President Xi suggested to Prime Minister Modi that India and China should set up a new bilateral trade target of $100 billion by 2020.
The India-China bilateral trade reached $84.44 billion last year, according to data of the Chinese General Administration of Customs in March.
The bilateral trade in 2017 rose by 18.63 per cent year-on-year to reach $84.44 billion. The two countries had earlier set a bilateral trade target of $100 billion by 2015. Gokhale said that India has allowed China’s state-owned Bank of China to open its branch in Mumbai.
“There were some discussion on trade and investment related issues. And in that context Xi told Modi that China is looking at enhancing agricultural exports from India including non-Basmati rice and sugar,” Gokhale said.
An agreement was signed between China’s General Administration of Customs and India’s Department of Agriculture, Cooperation and Farmers Welfare on Phytosanitary requirements for exporting rice from India to China, world’s biggest rice markets.