ITC: India improving trade, investment policies

India has made “significant changes” to some of its trade and investment policies since Prime Minister Narendra Modi assumed office in May 2014, according to the U.S. International Trade Commission.    The U.S. International Trade Commission said India has made “significant changes” to some of its trade and investment policies since Prime Minister Narendra Modi assumed office in May 2014. 
   A new report released by the fact-finding agency late last week identifies four major policy changes or new policies instituted by the Modi government from May 2014 to July 2015. They include foreign direct investment, tariffs and customs procedures, local-content and localization requirements, and standards and technical regulations.
   Specifically, since May 2014, India has raised foreign direct investment equity caps on the insurance and defense industries, removed the requirement for “pre-investment authorizations” in several industries, and encouraged foreign investment in the country’s railroads. 
   According to the ITC report, India has made several changes to its tariffs and customs procedures. For example, the government has reduced tariffs on some information, communications, and telecommunications products. “Some changes have improved U.S. access to the Indian market,” ITC said.
   India has also made changes to policies and practices related to local-content requirements. The changes affect measures that require foreign firms to purchase Indian inputs, conduct a share of business in India, conduct certain business activities in India, or submit to India-specific testing or registration,” ITC noted.
   While the Modi government has expressed a commitment to harmonize India’s standards with international standards and to increase engagement with the United States on standards, the ITC warned that U.S. industry and government representatives still report that the Modi government has at the same time “created new India-unique mandatory standards and technical requirements that increase costs, delay time to market, and operate to exclude certain U.S. products from the Indian market.”
   The report, which may be viewed here, was requested by the House Ways and Means and Senate Finance committees.