Deepening Trade Ties: India Looks To Import More Oil From The US
To expand trade relations with the US, India has indicated its interest to buy more oil from the nation, as reported by Business Standard. India imports 80 per cent of its oil requirements, most of which are from the Gulf nations.
“We expressed our readiness to import more gas and more oil from United States as a way of expanding trade,” India’s top diplomat, Foreign Secretary Vijay Gokhale said on Wednesday. “India is expected to import about $4 billion of oil from the United States this year,” he added.
India has a trade surplus with the US, to the tune of nearly $23 billion. This has been used by the Protectionist US President, Donald Trump, as an aid to attack India’s tariff policies on goods imported from his country.
Also, though the US has granted India and a few other countries, a waiver to continue importing oil from Iran, it would be prudent to expand its options with regards to its energy security.
In October 2017, India’s Paradip port received the first-ever shipment of crude oil from the US, making a shift in the Indo-US relations. With shale oil production reaching record highs in the US, the country could become a net exporter of energy in a few years.
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