SEVEN YEARS after China got a regional centre of Peru-based International Potato Center (CIP), the premier research-for-development organisation with focus on potato and sweetpotato, India is set to get a similar centre. The CIP-South Asia Regional Centre (CIP-SARC) is expected to come up in Agra.

Russia has warned Pakistan that it would ban rice imports again if Moscow's phytosanitary concerns are not addressed in future consignments after a quarantine organism was detected in the rice consignment. The warning came after Russia's Federal Service for Veterinary and Phytosanitary Surveillance (FSVPS) issued a notification regarding violations of international and Russian phytosanitary requirements over a shipment of rice imported from Pakistan.

After receiving representations from food businesses, the FSSAI has decided to create Food Product category for 'Edible Dried Fruits/ Vegetable Seeds' for the purpose of licensing through FoSCoS.

The Union Minister Shri Ashwini Vaishnaw said, with the introduction of new schemes and  preparing a framework in about a dozen different industrial sectors in the field of transport, power supply, logistic, digital connectivity and few other fields the country enabling to enhance exports upto the value of one lakh crore dollars by the year 2030 in the international market as such the country may  become a hub for the manufacturing as well as exports in future, under this framework.

There has been good market access offered on both sides but not enough to secure a free trade agreement (FTA), the UK government has said as Indian negotiators are in London this week to continue discussions with their British counterparts.

China, Russia, Iraq, UAE, Singapore are among countries where India’s exports in the just-concluded financial year have risen substantially, though with a low base.

India's trade deficit with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) has surged, more than doubling since the implementation of the Free Trade Agreement (FTA) in 2010.