CAIT asks for boycott of Chinese goods

By

Isabelle Crossley

Published
Aug 20, 2019

The Confederation of All India Traders has called for a boycott of Chinese goods and asked for high customs tariffs after China recently supported Pakistan at the United Nations Security Council.

CAIT has "given the call to boycott Chinese products to make China understand the repercussions of supporting Pakistan," according to its statement reported by the Press Trust of India. The trade body has also requested that customs duties on Chinese products entering India be raised to between 300% and as high as 500%.

China recently supported Pakistan’s case on the abrogation of Article 370 in Jammu and Kashmir at the United Nation Security Council. CAIT has responded that this move has greatly upset the Indian trading community. CAIT plans to discuss its requests at its upcoming national conference on August 29.

"China has become habitual in supporting Pakistan on every matter which is against India and therefore now the time has come when we should reduce our dependence on Chinese goods," said CAIT’s statement.

During the first five months of 2019, bilateral trade between India and China declined by 3.59% year-on-year to total $36.87 billion (Rs 245.3 lakh crore), according to a report by Mint. However, during that time, India’s cotton exports to China increased by 50.73% to total $837.9 million giving the country a market share in China of 18.19% and making it China’s second largest cotton exporter. India’s diamond exports to China were down by 29.34% but India is also still China’s second largest diamond exporter.