India is one of Russia's key partners. Over the past 5 years, the volume of mutual trade has increased almost 7 times. In the first 8 months of 2025, imports from India increased to $3.7 billion.
These data were provided by Vladimir Ilyichev, Deputy Minister of Economic Development of Russia, who led the Russian delegation at the 26th meeting of the Working Group on Trade and Economic Cooperation of the Intergovernmental Russian-Indian Commission on Trade, Economic, Scientific, Technical and Cultural Cooperation. The Indian delegation was headed by Rajesh Agrawal, Deputy Minister of Trade and Industry of India.
The parties noted the need to expand the trade structure and make better use of the bilateral potential. The heads of delegation also welcomed the signing of the terms of reference for negotiations on a free trade agreement between the EAEU and India and called for the early start of the first round.
During the negotiations, the parties agreed to continue working on removing trade barriers. The Russian side stressed that balancing Indian import duties on a number of goods would help diversify Russian exports, and requested that Russian companies issue certificates for certain types of products.
Additionally, issues of consumer protection, export credit insurance, support for small and medium-sized businesses, expansion of agricultural supplies, prospects for Indian exports to Russia, and improving the efficiency of financial infrastructure for bilateral operations and investments were discussed.
