India has a rich history of trade integration with EAC through the Indian Ocean sea route, and trade is likely to rise with these countries through systematic efforts and hassle-free trade policies and procedures on both sides.
In particular, the five East African Community EAC countries, namely Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda, have the potential to emerge as the doorway of the continent’s trade with India.
Like India, EAC countries are also involved in RTAs with other African partners through regional arrangements, namely SADC- Southern Africa Development Community, COMESA – Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa, CBI- Cross border initiative, CEPGL- Economic Community of the countries of the great lakes etc.
The group also receives a duty and quota-free access for its exports to EU market. India has initiated a similar entry for the LDC African countries through its duty free tariff preference scheme – DFTPI- LDC which has come into operation since mid-2008. This scheme covers all the EAC countries except Kenya.
The relations between the two countries are set to be revitalized especially in cultural exchange, trade and development cooperation. To ease work between the two sides, EAC inks a joint action plan between EAC and the government of India.
Following the signing of a joint action plan between India and EAC, EAC traders benefit from the faster clearance of their goods and lower costs of running their business. The collective action plan will pave way for a complete mutual recognition agreement between the two parties. MRA will benefit companies under the authorized economic operator’s programme run by EAC partner states under the cooperation of the EAC secretariat.
The selection of India as an MRA partner was based on mutual recognition and fairly steady trade between EAC and India over the past five years before corona virus disruptions.
MRA will save costs and foster growth in sustainable trade between the two sides while reducing non-tariff barriers and enhancing cooperation between the Customs departments of India and EAC.
India Africa trade council will open trade desks focusing on the EAC region in Karnataka and Tamil Nadu to facilitate Indian business people wanting to make trade-in EAC countries.