India and Chile are set to start talks on a Complete Financial Partnership Settlement (CEPA) with a deal with essential minerals, Prime Minister Narendra Modi introduced Tuesday throughout a press briefing with Chilean President Gabriel Boric Font in New Delhi.
House to the world’s largest reserves of lithium and copper — key inputs for electrical automobile (EV) batteries — Chile performs a pivotal position within the world essential minerals provide chain. Following the announcement, Union Union Minister of Coal and Mines G Kishan Reddy and Chile’s Minister of Mining Aurora Williams met to discover bilateral partnerships within the mining sector.
“At this time, we’ve instructed our groups to start discussions on a mutually useful Complete Financial Partnership Settlement. Partnership within the discipline of Important Minerals will probably be emphasised. Work will probably be finished to determine resilient provide and worth chains,” PM Modi stated on the briefing.
“India is able to share its optimistic expertise with Chile in digital public infrastructure, renewable vitality, railways, area and different areas,” he added.
President Boric is on a state go to to India from April 1 to five, throughout which he’ll meet business leaders in Mumbai and Bengaluru.
India-Chile commerce ties
Chile is India’s fifth largest buying and selling accomplice in South America, with bilateral commerce touching $3.8 billion in 2024 from $1.5 billion in 2020, in response to a word by the Ministry of Exterior Affairs (MEA). In 2024, exports from India totalled $1.2 billion and imports from Chile amounted to $2.6 billion.
Greater than half of Chile’s exports to India include copper ores and concentrates, unrefined copper, and copper scrap, adopted by molybdenum ores and concentrates. Since lithium-ion battery manufacturing in India remains to be in its early levels, it doesn’t import any lithium from Chile.
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Cars and prescription drugs lead India’s exports to Chile.
“India’s exports to Chile had been rising steadily since 2009, excluding a slight lower in 2014, when a brand new carbon tax on diesel autos in Chile adversely affected motorcar exports from India, however the sector noticed a giant restoration in a while,” the MEA word stated.
“India’s commerce with Chile registered a destructive progress over a few years as a result of world slowdown and the home social disaster and labour unrest in Chile. The commerce has since picked up and proven a sturdy restoration,” it added.
India and Chile’s announcement of a possible CEPA, set to facilitate freer commerce in essential minerals, follows their 2016 growth of the India-Chile Preferential Commerce Settlement (PTA) from 474 to 2,829 tariff traces.
Indian cos look to mine in Chile
In a roundtable together with his Chilean counterpart, Reddy stated with the approval of the Nationwide Important Mineral Mission (NCMM), India is eager on securing a secure provide of essential minerals for EVs, renewable vitality, and electronics manufacturing.
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“Indian corporations are additionally eager to discover Greenfield & Brownfield mining investments in Chile, fostering stronger G2G & B2B partnerships,” he stated, in response to a publish on X by the mines ministry.
The session was additionally attended by the chief executives of main Indian mining corporations, together with these with copper refineries like Hindalco, Adani, and Vedanta, who depend upon imports of copper concentrates and unrefined copper to be used as uncooked materials.
“The discussions centered on increasing cooperation in copper manufacturing, mineral exploration, and sustainable mining practices. CEOs raised key questions on funding alternatives and business-to-business partnerships,” the mines ministry stated on X.
In April final yr, Mines Secretary V L Kantha Rao had led a delegation to Santiago, Chile to take part in mining conferences and go to copper mines. In July 2024, Khanij Bidesh India Ltd (KABIL), a three way partnership below the mines ministry, signed an settlement with Chile’s state-owned Empresa Nacional de Minería (ENAMI) to discover a lithium block.