India – US Trade
Trade and commerce form a crucial component of the rapidly expanding and multi-faceted relations between India and US. From a modest $ 5.6 billion in 1990, the bilateral trade in merchandise goods has increased to $ 57.8 billion in 2011 representing an impressive 932.14% growth in a span of 21 years.
India’s merchandise exports to the U.S. grew by 19.88% from $ 7.93 billion during the period January- March 2011 to $ 9.50 billion in January- March 2012. US exports of merchandise to India also grew by 3.93% from $ 4.57 billion during the period January – March 2011to $ 4.74 billion in January – March 2012. India – US bilateral merchandise trade stands at $ 14.24 billion during this period.
Trade during the period January – March 2012
i) Major items of export from India to US
Select major items with their percentage shares, are given below.
a) Textiles (17.9%)
b) Precious stones & metals (16%)
c) Pharmaceutical products (10%)
d) Mineral Fuel, Oil (7.9%)
e) Lac, Gums, Resins (6.3%)
f) Organic chemicals (6.1%)
g) Machinery (5.6%)
h) Electrical Machinery ( 4.4%)
ii) Major items of export from US to India
Select major items with their percentage shares, are given below
a) Precious stones & metals (16.4%)
b) Machinery (16.1%)
c) Mineral fuel, Oil, etc. (9.2%)
d) Optical instruments & equipment (9%)
e) Electrical machinery (7.7%)
f) Organic chemicals (4.1%)
g) Plastic (3.6%)
h) Iron and steel (3.2%)
Trends with respect to the major items of bilateral trade during the past two years are as follows.
India’s exports to US
· Cut and polished diamonds and jewelry is a major item of India’s exports to the US, accounting for 22.2%. Exports of this item increased from $ 6.86 billion in 2010 to $ 8.02 billion in 2011, an increase of 17%.
· Textiles exports accounted for 17.4% of India’s exports to the US in 2011. Textile exports grew from $ 5.69 billion in 2010 to reach $ 6.28 billion in 2011, an increase of 10.37%.
· Exports of pharmaceutical products grew from $ 2.39 billion in 2010 to $ 3.22 billion in 2011, an increase of 34.5%.
· Exports of mineral fuel, oil grew from $ 2.32 billion in 2010 to $ 3.19 billion in 2011, an increase of 37.2%.
· Exports of organic chemicals grew by 15.5% from $ 1.72 billion in 2010 to $ 1.98 billion in 2011.
US exports to India
· Exports of precious stones and metals which accounted for 21.4% of exports from US to India grew by 9.9% to reach $ 4.62 billion in 2011 from $ 4.21 billion in 2010.
· Machinery exports grew by 9.8% from $ 2.67 billion in 2010 to $ 2.93 billion in 2011.
· Exports of electrical machinery grew by 12.7% from $ 1.36 billion in 2010 to $1.54 billion in 2011.
· Exports of aircraft, aviation machinery and parts, fell by 39.7% to $ 0.77 billion in 2011 from $1.28 billion in 2010.
During the year 2007, the basket of US imports to India included exceptionally large imports of aircraft /parts, which resulted in a leap in the growth rate of US exports to 54.7%. With this component excluded, the growth rates of US exports in 2007 and 2008 are 37.5% and 39.9% respectively.
