The recently signed Free Trade Agreement (FTA) between India and the United Kingdom is set to significantly boost Indian exports across key sectors such as textiles, gems and jewellery, and leather footwear.The FTA, which took over three years and 14 rounds of negotiations, is expected to add $35 billion to bilateral trade and reduce average Indian tariffs on UK goods from 15% to 3%. For Indian exporters, the elimination of duties on several products will create a level playing field, enabling them to compete more effectively with countries like Bangladesh, Vietnam, and Cambodia, which already enjoy zero-duty access to the UK market.
Pallab Banerjee, Managing Director and Group President of Pearl Global Industries, said India’s garment exports to the UK—currently worth over $1 billion—are expected to rise sharply. “The tariffs would go away, and we would be at par with other countries… India was at a disadvantage because Indian goods were subject to tariffs, whereas goods from Bangladesh, Vietnam, and Cambodia were not,” Banerjee told CNBC-TV18.
Currently, only around 5% of Pearl Global’s ₹4,506 crore in revenue comes from the UK, with a limited portion manufactured in India due to higher duties. Banerjee said that could change soon. “We expect the India portion of our UK sales to grow two to three times within the next one to one-and-a-half years,” he said, adding that customers are already planning to shift production to India following the FTA.In the jewellery space, Nitin Panwad, Group CFO of Vaibhav Global, said the deal will be a game changer. “Jewellery itself had a duty of roughly 3-5%, and that will now be removed,” he noted. Panwad expects higher demand from both physical retail and e-commerce platforms in the UK, where Indian craftsmanship is in high demand. Vaibhav Global currently exports about $15 million worth of jewellery to the UK.The footwear sector is also set to benefit in a big way. Tauseef Mirza, Managing Director of Mirza International, said, “This duty advantage is a huge boost to the specialty footwear and leather sector.” His company exports over ₹560 crore worth of goods, with nearly 70% going to the UK. “Currently, Indian exports to the UK stand at only $437 million in leather products, while UK imports are $6.7 billion. We should target $2 billion worth of exports from India to the UK within the next two to three years,” Mirza said.Watch accompanying video for entire discussion.
Source link
