Russia-India trade increases in 2021 amid Pandemic – Envoy

Trade turnover between Russia and India hit a record in 2021, notwithstanding the economic implications of the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic and Western sanctions against Moscow.

Russian Ambassador-designate to New Delhi, Denis Alipov told Sputnik that the most promising area of bilateral trade is high value-added products and processed goods.

The diplomat noted that the leaders of both countries set the target to increase bilateral trade turnover to 30 billion dollars by 2025.

According to him, the West has imposed unlawful sanctions against Russia, which India does not recognise, but must consider.

"All this brings difficulties, nevertheless, we are steadily increasing the bilateral trade turnover.

"From January to November 2021, the trade turnover between the two countries amounted to 12 billion dollars.

"This is a record trade level in many years, we can assert that the total annual value will be even higher.''

He added that the Russian exports of crude oil and petroleum to India tripled for the past year, with distillates supplies rising more than fourfold, diamonds by 1.5 times, and gold by 3.3 times.

Meanwhile, exports of radar equipment increased 65-fold, while vaccines supplies grew 911 times.

"This tells us that the highest potential in trade with India lies in promoting exports of products with high added value, processed commodities, high-tech goods.

"This includes machinery, equipment, pharmaceutical products, food commodities, as well as fertiliser and forest industry products," Alipov said.

He also added that Russian imports from India include medicines, machinery, equipment components, textiles, and food products.

Furthermore, Moscow and New Delhi continue intensive consultations to update the intergovernmental agreement on mutual protection of investments and work on removing barriers to mutual trade.