Sixth round of India-China strategic economic dialogue from Saturday

The three-day India-China strategic economic dialogue will start from Saturday which will discuss various issues, including infrastructure, energy and pharmaceuticals. The dialogue will comprise of round table meetings of joint working groups (JWG) on infrastructure, energy, high-tech, resource conservation,

pharmaceuticals and policy coordination, an official statement said. The Indian side will be led by Niti Aayog Vice Chairman and the Chinese

side by Chairman of National Development and Reforms Commission (NDRC). Senior representatives from industry, policy making and academia

will participate in the dialogue from both sides. Niti Aayog (earlier Planning Commission) on the Indian side, while NDRC from China will lead the SED (strategic economic dialogue) mechanism, wherein an annual dialogue is held annually - alternately at the capital cities of the two countries.

At the second meeting in November 2012 here, it was decided to constitute five standing joint working groups. "Under the aegis of the SED, senior representatives from both sides come together to constructively deliberate on and share individual best practices and successfully identify sector-specific challenges and opportunities for enabling ease of doing business and facilitating bilateral trade and investment flows," it added.

The bilateral trade between the countries stood at USD 87 billion in 2018-19. The trade deficit stood at USD 50 billion in favour of China.