Pakistan in the process to offer NDMA to India: report

Pakistan is expected to reduce its sensitive lists to 100 tariff lines, according to WTO's Trade Policy Review report

GENEVA: Pakistan is in the process of granting the Non-Discriminatory Market Access (NDMA) status to India, according to World Trade Organization (WTO) report.

"…Under NDMA, Pakistan is expected to reduce its sensitive lists to 100 tariff lines," the Trade Policy Review report of the WTO said.

NDMA is a nomenclature chosen by Pakistan to avoid political implications of giving India MFN (Most Favoured Nation) status.

India granted the MFN status to Pakistan in 1996 but Pakistan is yet to reciprocate. Granting the status to India would help in further boosting trade between the countries.

Pakistan, which committed giving India the MFN status in 2012, postponed it because of a lack of consensus among different stakeholders.

Giving NDMA status to India means abolition of the negative list, which includes 1,209 tradeable items between the two countries.

While bilateral trade between India and Pakistan stood at $2.7 billion in 2013-14.,  India's main exports to Pakistan include sugar, and chemicals, while its imports include mineral fuels, among others.

The article originally appeared on The Economic Times