For a few days now, Chileprunes, led by its president, Pedro Pablo Díaz, has been part of the official tour and prospective mission of our country to India, which was organized by ProChile and Sofofa.
It is the first trip with these characteristics to the Asian country in the last 5 years.
The objective is to promote national exports, seek formulas to increase trade with Chile and discuss opportunities to negotiate a free trade agreement (FTA) between both countries.
Chile and India have a Partial Scope Agreement (PAA) that entered into force in August 2007. Following the signing, Chile was the first country in Latin America to sign a bilateral agreement with India.
On the side of Chileprunes, the specific objective is to make the Chilean prunes industry visible and increase its consumption in the most populous market in the world -starting this year-, and where as a country, we are the main global exporters. Already in our last EXPO Prunes 2023, held at the end of March, we had pointed out the idea of continuing to work intensely jointly, publicly and privately, to take care of the markets that have opened up (China, Mexico and Europe), and return to one that is of great interest: India.
Busy schedule
With activities that began on Monday, June 19, meetings have been held with authorities from the Ministry of Commerce, Food Safety and Standards, the Indian Chamber of Commerce, and with importers and retail representatives.
The delegation met with the assistant secretary of the Ministry of Commerce, Rajesh Agrawal, with whom it was possible to talk about the bilateral relationship between the two countries. Likewise, Pedro Pablo Díaz, has established meetings with Ranjit Singh, director of International Cooperation of the Department of Agriculture of India; Juan Angulo, Chilean ambassador in that country; with Germán Ilabaca, president of the Chile India Business Council, from Sofofa; in addition to other Chilean leaders.
From the retail area, the delegation met with DRB Foods to boost the shipment of walnuts and plums from Chile to India, and with Bigbasket, an online supermarket that processes some 15 million orders per month. With the latter, topics on the cold chain, logistics and how the presence of Chile can be strengthened in the largest e-commerce platform in India were addressed.
The relevance of India
India is the fifth largest economy in the world with a GDP of US$2.5 trillion. With around 1.4 billion inhabitants, it is the most populous country in the world, surpassing China in a few months.
The Asian nation has shown great dynamism in its economic growth in recent years and is increasingly playing a relevant role in the global economy and geopolitics.
Currently, bilateral trade reached 1,513 million dollars last year. In this scenario, only 300 companies exported 220 products last year worth US$754 million, including copper minerals and their concentrates, molybdenum, iodine, nuts, cellulose, lithium, gold, kiwis and apples, among others.
Currently, the investment of Indian companies in Chile is equivalent to around US$ 220 million.
