Services led exports are a mixed blessing for us

Even as we celebrate India's emergence as a services-led economy, with our service exports strong and their prospects bright amid rising trade flux, we must look beyond the numbers

I fevery cloud has a silver lining, the glow around India's data that shows November's trade deficit at a record high of $37.9 billion is the remarkable performance of service exports. According to provisional numbers released by the government, service exports are projected to overtake merchandise exports in November 2024. This is in line with the trend of relative growth over the past few years. In a scenario where US President-elect Donald Trump has threatened to slap "reciprocal" tariffs on India ("If they tax us, we tax them the same amount," he said on Tuesday), this strong showing of service exports and declining reliance on the export of goods is a matter of comfort. Unlike goods trade, which is easily hit by protectionist barriers going up in big markets and is also exposed to geopolitical disruptions, as in West Asia and Ukraine, service exports are largely free of such constraints.