PIKIRAN RAKYAT - Indonesian Trade Minister Zulkifli Hasan departed for India to explore the export cooperation of Indonesia's leading commodities during a working visit scheduled from March 13–14, 2023.
"South Asia, especially India, is a non-traditional potential market that must be intensively developed." Therefore, together with several parties, we will meet with Indian stakeholders to fight for Indonesia's leading products," said Zulkifli Hasan in an official statement.
As part of his visit, the Trade Minister is scheduled to deliver a keynote speech at the Partnership Summit 2023 of the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) in New Delhi during the Inaugural Session. Additionally, he will be giving a speech at a special session focused on Indonesia during the CII Partnership Summit 2023.
In addition to participating in the CII Partnership Summit, the Trade Minister is scheduled to meet with the Indian Minister of Trade and Industry, Piyush Goyal, to follow up on the instruction of President Joko Widodo of Indonesia to explore bilateral trade negotiations with India.
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The two ministers are planning to discuss bilateral trade issues and follow up on the previous meeting at the G20 Trade, Industry, and Investment Ministerial Meeting in Bali in September 2022. Furthermore, the Trade Minister will meet with friendly country ministers who attend the CII Partnership Summit 2023 and meet with several Indian business actors and business association leaders.
In 2022, the total trade between Indonesia and India amounted to $32.71 billion, which was a significant increase of 55.68 percent from the previous year's figure of $21.01 billion. Indonesia enjoyed a trade surplus of $14.05 billion in the same year, with exports to India amounting to $23.38 billion, while imports from India were worth $9.33 billion. Thus, Indonesia enjoyed a trade surplus of 14.05 billion US dollars.
Some of Indonesia's primary export products to India are coal, palm oil and its derivatives, alloy steel, industrial monocarboxylic acids, copper ore, and concentrates. On the other hand, Indonesia's major imported products from India include semi-finished iron products, sugarcane or sugar beet, peanuts, frozen buffalo meat, as well as ferroalloys.
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Indonesian and Indian Long-Standing Trade Relationship
From 2010 to 2018, the trade relationship between Indonesia and India showed a mixed trend. The bilateral trade volume grew from US$12.89 billion in 2010 to US$21.13 billion in 2015, a compound annual growth rate of 10.35%. However, in the following years, the trade volume declined to US$18.13 billion in 2016, and then gradually increased to US$20.57 billion in 2018.