Canada and India are negotiating a free trade deal anchored in energy, agri-food, and technology, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney said, describing a potential agreement as a game changer for Canada’s businesses and workers.
“We’re negotiating a free trade deal with India. This will be a game changer for Canadian workers and businesses — unlocking a massive new market,” Carney said in posts on his social media channels.
Carney met with India’s Minister of Commerce and Industry, Piyush Goyal, to review the progress so far and explore the opportunities ahead for both countries in energy, agri-food, tech, and education, the Canadian official said, a few months after Canada and another major developing Asian market, China, agreed on trade and energy cooperation deals.
India’s minister Goyal said of his meeting with Carney that “We had forward-looking discussions on further deepening bilateral cooperation and expressed optimism towards the early conclusion of the India-Canada Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA), which would unlock new avenues of growth and prosperity for both nations.”
“Confident that India and Canada will achieve a very good, fair, equitable, and balanced CEPA, which will define the roadmap as the two economies power on,” Goyal said in a post on X.
The Indian minister was leading a delegation on a visit to Canada with “India’s largest-ever business delegation to any country,” he said.
Canada and India are resetting their bilateral relations, which were chilled by the killing of a Sikh activist in Canada in 2023.
Faced with tariffs by its top trade partner, the U.S., Canada is eager to diversify its exports, including energy exports, to Asia.
At the beginning of the year, Canada forged energy and trade cooperation agreements with China. Energy, forestry, food safety, crime, and culture were areas in which the two economies pledged cooperation, as Canada is seeking to diversify trade partners away from the United States in the face of the hostile trade policy of the Trump Administration.
By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com
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