Australia’s Parliament on Tuesday (22 November) passed bilateral free trade agreement with India. The Bill easily passed the House of Representatives on Monday and cleared the Senate hurdle on Tuesday. Announcing the passage of the FTA with India, Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said, “Our Free Trade Agreement with India has passed through parliament”.
The India-Australia FTA was signed in April this year, and was the trade pact that New Delhi had singed with a developed country after over a decade. The agreement encompasses cooperation across the entire gamut of bilateral economic and commercial relations between the two friendly countries,
and covers areas like Trade in Goods, Rules of Origin, Trade in Services, Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT), Sanitary and Phytosanitary (SPS) measures, Dispute Settlement, Movement of Natural Persons, Telecom, Customs Procedures, Pharmaceutical products, and Cooperation in other Areas.
India will benefit from preferential market access provided by Australia on 100 per cent of its tariff lines. This includes all the labour-intensive sectors of export interest to India such as Gems and Jewellery, Textiles, leather, footwear, furniture, food, and agricultural products, engineering products, medical devices, and Automobiles.
On the other hand, India will be offering preferential access to Australia on over 70 per cent of its tariff lines, including lines of export interest to Australia which are primarily raw materials and intermediaries such as coal, mineral ores and wines etc
