India Has Highest Tariffs Among Major Economies: US Ambassador Garcetti

We need together to increase trade and to make it more fair and equal. We need to together make sure that there's training and talent that meets the needs of companies on both sides of the Indo Pacific - Eric Garcetti, US Ambassador

US Ambassador to India Eric Garcetti said India is the "highest tariff" major economy in the world and New Delhi and Washington need to work together to lower tariffs to increase trade for making it "fair and equal".

His comment comes days after US President-elect Donald Trump said that India charges "a lot" of tariff, reiterating his intention to impose reciprocal tariffs in retaliation for what New Delhi will impose on the import of certain American products.

Addressing an event organised by the US-India Business Council (USIBC), Garcetti observed that as the two countries "become closer", they are able to be "more blunt" with each other. "... We need together to lower tariffs, not to see them go up. We need together to increase trade and to make it more fair and equal. We need to together make sure that there's training and talent that meets the needs of companies on both sides of the Indo Pacific," Garcetti, the United States (US) Ambassador to India, said.

In an interactive session after his address, Garcetti pointed out that "despite the difficulties on both sides", the India-US bilateral trade has witnessed a "10-fold increase", with America becoming the country's number one trading partner. "... I think that as you hear, as recently as yesterday, President-elect Trump talk about trade and how tariffs need to be done fairly, let us have honest conversations. I think it's helpful for us to speak bluntly, but let us use that as a starting point to negotiate much more deeply than we do," the US Ambassador to India said.

He further outlined that even though the US and India don't really talk in ambitious ways about trade, yet the two countries have expanded trade ten-fold since 2001. Garcetti urged his audience to imagine what the two countries could achieve if they actually sat down and had all these conversations.

"Imagine what we could do if we actually sat down and had all these conversations... The US, could say you might be down 95 per cent from what tariffs used to be, but it's still the highest tariff major economy in the world, here in India. And too often, there are barriers that take too long and are too arbitrary, and everything from labour to land, as we have too in the United States," he asserted.

Trump has repeatedly claimed that India is a "tariff king" and imposes "tremendously high" tariffs on American products. He has criticised India's "big tariffs" on American paper products and the iconic Harley-Davidson bikes. The US is the largest trading partner of India in 2023-24. India's exports stood at $77.51 billion, while imports aggregated at $42.2 billion in the last fiscal.

During April-October this fiscal, the country's exports to America rose by 6.31 per cent to $47.24 billion, while imports grew by 2.46 per cent to $26 billion. Between FY20 and FY24, India's merchandise exports to America rose by 46 per cent from $53.1 billion to $77.5 billion.

Imports from the US also grew to $42.2 billion last fiscal from $35.8 billion in 2019-20. On the other hand, trade in services between the two nations expanded 30.3 per cent from $54.1 billion in 2018 to an estimated $70.5 billion in 2024.

India is also a key destination for American businesses such as professional, scientific, and technical services, manufacturing, and IT. Washington is the third largest investor. India received $66.7 billion of FDI inflow between April 2000 and June 2024.