Commerce minister Piyush Goyal to co-chair India-Canada ministerial trade dialogue

NEW DELHI: Commerce minister Piyush Goyal will on Monday co-chair the discussions for the sixth India-Canada ministerial dialogue on trade and investment (MDTI) in Ottawa, Canada, along with his Canadian counterpart Mary Ng.
MDTI is a bilateral mechanism which provides institutional mechanism to discuss a broad spectrum of trade and investment related issues and cooperation areas. The dialogue will focus on various themes, including strengthening the bilateral trade relationship between India and Canada, investment promotion and cooperation, green transition – including critical minerals discussion and new areas of cooperation such as promoting B2B engagements.

The ministers will also review India-Canada CEPA (Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement) negotiations. At the last MDTI meeting in March 2022, both ministers had launched the CEPA negotiations with a possibility to have an interim agreement or EPTA (Early Progress Trade Agreement). Since then, seven rounds of negotiations have been held. Goyal will also be visiting Toronto from May 9 to 10, where he will have various engagements to promote trade and investment.

These engagements will include meetings with CEOs of key Canadian companies, round table of Indian and Canadian CEOs, interaction with Canadian and Indian companies based in Canada and financial sector round table among other meetings.