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India’s trade deficit with China may reach $106 billion in 2025: GTRI

admin — Fri, 19 Dec 2025 06:57:00 +0000

In 2025, exports are estimated to improve to $17.5 billion, still well below earlier levels. File.
| Photo Credit: Reuters

India’s trade deficit with China is expected to reach $106 billion in 2025 as imports are rising faster than the country’s exports to the neighbouring country, think tank GTRI said on Friday (December 19, 2025).

It said that the country’s exports to China fell from $23 billion in 2021 to $15.2 billion in 2022, stayed low at $14.5 billion in 2023, and then edged up to $15.1 billion in 2024.

In 2025, exports are estimated to improve to $17.5 billion, still well below earlier levels, the Global Trade Research Initiative (GTRI) said in its report.

On the other hand, imports from the neighbouring country have climbed much faster — from $87.7 billion in 2021 to $102.6 billion in 2022, $91.8 billion in 2023 and $109.6 billion in 2024.

This calendar year, the country’s inbound shipments are estimated at $123.5 billion.

“This has pushed India’s trade deficit (difference between imports and exports) with China from $64.7 billion in 2021 to $94.5 billion in 2024, and an expected $106 billion in 2025,” GTRI Founder Ajay Srivastava said.

On December 16, in a written reply to the Lok Sabha, Minister of State for Commerce and Industry Jitin Prasada has said that the deficit is mainly due to imports of raw materials, intermediate goods and capital goods, like auto components, electronic parts and assemblies, mobile phone parts, machinery and its parts, Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients, which are used for making finished products which are also exported out of India.

“An Inter-Ministerial Committee (IMC) has been constituted to consider the trends with respect to imports and exports and recommend corrective action wherever required,” he has said.

According to the GTRI, nearly 80% of India’s imports from China are concentrated in just four product groups – electronics, machinery, organic chemicals and plastics.

During January-October 2025, India’s imports from China were dominated by electronics, which totalled $38 billion. This included imports of mobile phone components ($ 8.6 billion), integrated circuits ($6.2 billion), laptops ($4.5 billion), solar cells and modules ($3 billion), flat-panel displays ($2.6 billion), lithium-ion batteries ($2.3 billion) and memory chips ($1.8 billion). Machinery imports followed at $25.9 billion, with transformers alone accounting for $2.1 billion, highlighting India’s dependence on Chinese capital goods for power and industrial projects, Srivastava said adding organic chemicals reached $11.5 billion, driven by antibiotics imports of $1.7 billion, underscoring China’s dominance in pharmaceutical intermediates.

Plastics imports during the period stood at $6.3 billion, including $871 million of PVC resin, while steel and steel products amounted to $4.6 billion and medical and scientific equipment added $2.5 billion.

“Together, these figures show that India’s import bill from China is anchored in electronics, machinery, chemicals and materials that are difficult to substitute quickly, explaining the persistence of a large bilateral trade deficit despite efforts to diversify supply chains,” he added.

In November, India’s exports to China rose by 90% to $2.2 billion. During April-November, the exports were up 33% to $ 12.2 billion.

Increasing exports of Naphtha, used in the plastic industry, is the biggest contributor to push the growth rate in November. Electronics goods, including printed circuit boards and mobile phone components too recorded healthy growth during the month.

Published – December 19, 2025 12:27 pm IST

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S Jaishankar On Trade With China

admin — Fri, 06 Dec 2024 00:37:08 +0000

S Jaishankar said that he is not asking the Indian industry to not do business with China.

New Delhi:

Indian businesses should take a “balanced” approach in dealing with China as excessive dependence on its supply chain could be detrimental to India’s national interest, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar said on Thursday.

In an interactive session at industry chamber ASSOCHAM, Mr Jaishankar, at the same time, said he was not asking the Indian industry to not do business with that country.

To a question on evolving relations with China, he said with that country accounting for 32-33 percent of global manufacturing, it is logical that several supply chains will have to go through China.

“It is a reality which we will have to factor (that) into our calculations.” “But it is also a fact that if you become excessively dependent on a single supply chain or in the name of supply chain, you open up your market that it is no longer a supply chain, but your sectors are getting hollowed out. You have to be careful,” he said.

“Nobody is saying don’t do business. But we are equally saying think about it, weigh it, look at the bigger term implications,” he said.

The external affairs minister also briefly referred to the almost four-and-half-year-long border standoff between the two countries along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in eastern Ladakh that ended last month.

“We have managed to make some progress out there. We have to now sit down and discuss with the Chinese what we do further… You know, there are no black and white answers in very sharp terms. I think everything needs to be balanced,” he said.

To a question on disruption in the shipping lanes in the Red Sea in view of the situation in West Asia, Mr Jaishankar said trade is impacted by it.

“I think it is a big concern for us. We have tried to do our share. We actually deployed some Navy ships as well,” he said.

The external affairs minister said alternative routes for supplies are increasing the transportation cost of the shipments.

“It is of very direct economic consequence. So we have actually been interacting with all the major players including Iran and Israel,” he said.

“We want restraint. We want a cooling down. We want a ceasefire and we want negotiations so that actually our economic interests are not threatened,” he said.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

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India’s H1 trade with China declines amid slowdown

admin — Thu, 13 Jul 2023 13:43:05 +0000

India’s trade with China has declined in the first half of 2023 after more than two years of record growth. Image used for representation purpose only. File
| Photo Credit: K.K. Mustafah

India’s trade with China declined in the first half of 2023 after more than two years of record growth, part of a broader slump in China’s trade performance that has underlined a sharp slowdown in the world’s second-largest economy

Two-way trade reached $66.02 billion in the first half, data from China’s General Administration of Customs (GAC) showed on Thursday. India’s imports from China slid 0.9% to $56.53 billion, while exports to its northern neighbour fell by 0.6% to $9.49 billion.

India’s imports of Chinese goods were $57.51 billion in the first half of 2022.

However, India’s trade deficit — the largest it has with any country — did not narrow substantially because exports to China also declined due to weak demand. The January-June trade stood at $47.04 billion, marginally narrower than H1 2022’s $47.94 billion.

China’s overall H1 exports declined by 12.4%, a drop that exceeded most economists’ expectations. The trade slump is expected to reinforce concerns that China’s brief recovery, after emerging in January from three months of harsh COVID-19 curbs, is already running out of steam.

India’s trade with China in 2023 may see a rare decline after years of breakneck growth, with the first year of the pandemic being an exception. Trade rebounded to historic highs in 2021 and 2022. In 2022, trade reached a record $135.98 billion, driven by a 21% rise in imports into India. The trade deficit crossed $100 billion for the first time last year. India’s biggest imports from China have included active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs), chemicals, machinery, auto components, and medical supplies.

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