{"id":41041,"date":"2025-10-27T05:29:10","date_gmt":"2025-10-26T23:59:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/?p=41041"},"modified":"2025-10-30T15:04:29","modified_gmt":"2025-10-30T09:34:29","slug":"foreign-trade-in-india","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/foreign-trade-in-india\/","title":{"rendered":"India\u2019s Foreign Trade with its Major Trading Partners"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2>What\u2019s in today\u2019s article?<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>Why in News?<\/li>\n<li>India\u2019s Foreign Trade<\/li>\n<li>Latest Trends of India\u2019s Foreign Trade<\/li>\n<li>India\u2019s Trade Deficit with its Major Trading Partners<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2>Why in News?<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>According to the latest data of the Ministry of Commerce &amp; India, India has recorded a trade deficit (difference between imports and exports) with 9 of its top 10 trading partners in fiscal year (FY) 2023-24.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2>India\u2019s Foreign Trade:<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Overview:<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>Foreign trade in India includes all (merchandise + services) imports and exports to and from India and it accounted for <strong>48.8% of India&#8217;s GDP in 2018<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<li>At the level of the Central Government, trade is administered by the <strong>Ministry of Commerce and Industry.<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>In 2022, India was the number 15 in total exports, the number 8 in total imports.<\/li>\n<li>According to the Commerce Ministry data, <strong>China <\/strong>was India&#8217;s top trading partner from 2013-14 till 2017-18 and also in 2020-21.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Before China<\/strong>, the UAE was the country&#8217;s largest trading partner. <strong>The US was the largest partner in 2021-22 and 2022-23.<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Exports (merchandise):<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>The top exports of India are<\/strong> Refined Petroleum ($86.2B), Diamonds ($25.9B), Packaged Medicaments ($19.5B), Jewellery ($12.6B), and Rice ($11.1B).<\/li>\n<li><strong>It exports mostly to the United States<\/strong> ($82.9B), United Arab Emirates ($31.6B), Netherlands ($17.6B), China ($15.3B), and Bangladesh ($13.8B).<\/li>\n<li><strong>In 2022, India was the world&#8217;s biggest exporter <\/strong>of Diamonds ($25.9B), Rice ($11.1B), etc.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Imports (merchandise):<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>The top imports of India<\/strong> are Crude Petroleum ($170B), Coal Briquettes ($58.7B), Gold ($35.8B), Petroleum Gas ($32B), and Diamonds ($26.1B).<\/li>\n<li><strong>It imports mostly from China <\/strong>($110B), UAE ($51B) and the US ($48.5B), Saudi Arabia ($46.2B), and Russia ($40.4B).<\/li>\n<li><strong>In 2022, India was the world&#8217;s biggest importer<\/strong> of Coal Briquettes ($58.7B), Diamonds ($26.1B), Palm Oil ($11.1B), Mixed Mineral or Chemical Fertilizers ($7.88B), and Nitrogenous Fertilizers ($7.37B).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2>Latest Trends of India\u2019s Foreign Trade:<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>As per the data from the economic think tank GTRI, <strong>China has overtaken the US as India&#8217;s largest trading partner<\/strong>, with a total two-way commerce of <strong>$118.4 billion<\/strong>, in the <strong>FY 2023-24.<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>India&#8217;s exports to China rose by 8.7% to $16.67 billion, while imports increased by 3.24% to $101.7 billion.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>On the other hand, exports to the <strong>US <\/strong>dipped slightly to $77.5 billion, and imports decreased by about 20% to $40.8 billion (the two-way commerce stood at $118.3 billion).<\/li>\n<li><strong>The UAE<\/strong> with USD 83.6 billion, was the third largest trading partner of India. It was followed by <strong>Russia <\/strong>($65.7 billion), <strong>Saudi Arabia<\/strong> ($43.4 billion), and <strong>Singapore <\/strong>($35.6 billion).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2>India\u2019s Trade Deficit with its Major Trading Partners:<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Latest trends:<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>India\u2019s trade deficit <\/strong>with China rose to $85 billion, Russia to $57.2 billion, Korea to $14.71 billion and Hong Kong to $12.2 billion in 2023-24 against $83.2 billion, $43 billion, $14.57 billion and $8.38 billion in 2022-23.<\/li>\n<li><strong>India has a trade surplus<\/strong> of $36.74 billion with the U.S. in 2023-24 and America is one of the few countries with which India has a trade surplus along with the U.K., Belgium, Italy, France and Bangladesh.<\/li>\n<li><strong>India&#8217;s total trade deficit<\/strong> in the last fiscal narrowed to $238.3 billion as against $264.9 billion in the previous fiscal.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>What can be drawn from these latest trends?<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Imports are not always bad<\/strong> if a country is importing raw materials or intermediary products to boost manufacturing and exports.<\/li>\n<li>However, it can cause the country&#8217;s currency to <strong>depreciate <\/strong>because more foreign currency is needed for imports.<\/li>\n<li>This depreciation makes<strong> imports more expensive, worsening the deficit and increasing external debt<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<li>This can deplete foreign exchange reserves and signal economic instability to investors, leading to reduced foreign investment.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>What needs to be done to cut the trade deficit? <\/strong>Boosting exports, reducing unnecessary imports, developing domestic industries, and managing currency and debt levels effectively.<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<h3>Q.1. What is the share of services in India&#8217;s total foreign trade?<\/h3>\n<p>With 4.6% of all services traded globally, India ranks seventh in the world as a commercial service exporter as of 2023.<\/p>\n<h3>Q.2. What is India&#8217;s foreign trade policy (FTP) 2023?<\/h3>\n<p>The FTP 2023 aims at process re-engineering and automation to facilitate ease of doing business for exporters. It also focuses on emerging areas like dual use high end technology items, facilitating e-commerce export, collaborating with States and Districts for export promotion.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Source: <\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/timesofindia.indiatimes.com\/business\/india-business\/india-in-trade-deficit-with-nine-of-top-10-trading-partners-in-2023-24\/articleshow\/110438022.cms\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">India in trade deficit with nine of top 10 trading partners in 2023-24<\/a> | <a href=\"https:\/\/economictimes.indiatimes.com\/news\/economy\/foreign-trade\/china-overtakes-us-to-become-indias-top-trading-partner-in-fy-2023-24\/printarticle\/110049223.cms\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">ET<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>India has recorded a trade deficit (difference between imports and exports) with 9 of its top 10 trading partners in fiscal year (FY) 2023-24<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":41042,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-41041","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-upsc-mains-current-affairs","8":"no-featured-image-padding"},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41041","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41041"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41041\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/41042"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41041"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41041"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41041"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}