Beijing [China], Oct. 14 : Beijing has warned of bitter bilateral ties with New Delhi citing huge trade deficits and ongoing social media campaigns calling for boycotting Chinese goods in India.
"It seems that India is not on the right path, as the country is trying to reduce its trade deficit with China through trade protectionism.
Besides, a social media campaign urging people to refrain from buying China-made products has recently been building in India.
Such moves will not help contribute to reducing India's trade deficit, but could damage bilateral ties instead," said a report published in the Global Times.
It said that according to reports in March, there had been 322 anti-dumping cases in India so far, of which 177 cases involved Chinese products.
The reports also highlights that India has just recorded a large trade deficit with China. Data from China's General Administration of Customs showed that India in September exported goods worth USD 922 million to China, while importing goods worth USD5.4 billion from China.
"The huge trade deficit with China has become an increasingly unharmonious factor in bilateral ties between the two countries, requiring China and India to take practical measures to narrow the trade imbalance when leaders of the two nations meet in India over the weekend for the BRICS summit," it said.
The report also called for finding the root causes of the trade imbalance. The major imports from China include electronic components, telecom instruments, chemicals and pharmaceutical products, while India's major exports to China include ore, plastics and cotton.
The report said the imbalanced bilateral trade structure is actually a result of the fact that China and India are at different developmental stages in terms of industrialization.
"It won't be easy to reduce India's trade deficit with China simply by relying on measures such as seeking greater access to the Chinese market for India's raw materials and agricultural products - India also needs to upgrade its industrial structure," the report said further.
"Efforts such as encouraging Chinese smartphone makers to set up production lines in India may be the most effective way to reduce the trade deficit, which is partly the result of a price gap between India's imports of finished goods and its exports of raw materials," it added.
Source: ANI
