Foreign trade has played a crucial role in India's economy growing at almost three times the growth of GDP during the last four years. India's exports cover a wide range of items including engineering goods, ores and minerals, chemicals and related products, gems and jewellery and of late, petroleum products. Imports have increased substantially, bulk of which comprise items like petroleum and crude products, fertilizers, precious and semi-precious stones for export production, and capital goods, raw materials, consumables and intermediates for industrial production and technological upgradation.

(Rs crore)
Year	Exports	Imports	Total Trade	Trade Deficit
1990-91	32558	43193	75751	-10635
1991-92	44042	47851	91893	-3809
1992-93	53688	63375	117063	-9687
1993-94	69751	73101	142852	-3350
1994-95	82674	89971	172645	-7297
1995-96	106353	122678	229031	-16325
1996-97	118817	138920	257737	-20103
1997-98	130101	154176	284277	-24075
1998-99	139753	178332	318085	-38579
1999-2000	159561	215236	374797	-55675
2000-01	209018	230873	434444	-27302
2001-02	255137	245200	454218	-36182
2002-03	293367	297206	552343	-42069
2003-04	375340	359108	652475	-65741
2004-05	375340	501065	876405	-125725
2005-06	456483	635013	1091496	-178530
2006-07(P)	563800	820568	1384368	-256768
(P) Provisional data.

Trade Scenario

India's total external trade (exports plus imports including re-exports) in the year 1950-51 stood at Rs. 1214 crores. Since then, this has witnessed continuous increase with occasional downturns. During 2006-07 the value of India's external trade reached Rs. 1384368 crore. A statement indicating India's total export, import, total value of foreign trade and balance of trade from the year 1990-91 to 2006-07(P), in rupee terms, is given in table 7.1 (see above).

India's exports of merchandise goods touched the target of US$125 billion in 2006-07 recording a growth of around 21% in dollar terms. In Rupee terms, the exports of merchandise goods during 2006-07 was valued at Rs. 563800 compared to Rs. 456483 crore in 2005-06 with a growth rate of 24%. India's growth of exports is much higher than that of the world economy as well as the many major economies of the world.

At the same time, imports increased from Rs. 635013 crore in 2005-2006 to Rs. 820568 crore during 2006-2007 thereby registering a growth of 29% in rupee terms. The trade deficit in 2006-07 was Rs. (-) 256768 crore as against Rs. (-) 178530 crores during 2005-06.

India has trading relations with all the major trading blocks and all the geographical regions of the world. Region-wise and sub region-wise spread of India's trade during 2005-06 and 2006-07 is given in table 7.2. In dollar terms, Asia & Asean accounted for 48.46 per cent of India's total exports, followed by West Europe (24.06%) and America (20.61%) during 2005-06. India's imports were highest from Asia & Asean (35.22%) followed by West Europe (21.17%) and America (7.78%), during the same period.

(Rs crore)
Region	Exports		Importst
	April-March		April-March
	2005-06	2006-07*	2005-06	2006-07
I. Europe	109429	105577	133464	137684
1.1 EU countries 25	101600	97730	101127	98770
1.2 Other WE countries	7146	6874	30960	37611
1.3 East Europe	682	973	1377	1303
II. Africa	24723	29975	17156	44035
III. America	93719	89512	490665	65816
IV. Asia and Asean	220377	229763	222055	409918
V. CIS & Baltics	5480	5429	12780	13513
VI. Unspecified Region	1072	2948	630526	674443
*April-January figures