US Invokes Trade War On India? Concessions To 50 Indian Goods Revoked, No Longer Eligible For GSP Benefits

President Donald Trump revoked duty-free concessions that were granted to 50 products from India on Thursday (1 November). Most of these are handloom and agricultural products, Press Trust of India reported.

Mr Trump signed off a presidential proclamation making these goods ineligible to benefit from duty-free provisions under the Generalised System of Preferences (GSP). GSP is a US trade preference program which promotes growth in developing countries. It does so by eliminating duties on goods that are imported into the US from beneficiary countries. 120 countries are part of the program.

According to an official of the US Trade Representative, the delisted products “will no longer qualify for duty-free preferences under the GSP programme but may continue to be imported subject to regular Most Favoured Nation duty-rates.”

India had urged the US in June 2018 to refrain from revoking GSP and Puneet Roy Kundal, Minister Commerce at the Indian Embassy had said in a statement that any withdrawal of benefits "would be discriminatory and detrimental to the development, finance and trade needs of India - a vast and diverse developing country with unique challenges.” India has a trade surplus to the tune of $23 billion (2017) with the US.