Canada’s Minister of International Trade Maninder Sidhu will lead a business delegation from the country to India in October this year.
Sidhu made that announcement on Friday even as negotiators from India were engaged in the third round of talks towards a comprehensive economic partnership (CEPA) in Ottawa in recent days.
Sidhu called on the country’s businesses to join Team Canada Trade Mission to India which is scheduled from October 12 to October 16.
“India is one of the world’s fastest-growing major economies, and Canadian businesses have a real opportunity to grow alongside it,” he said, in a statement.
With Canada-India bilateral trade is currently over CA$31 billion, the intent of the CEPA is the double that figure by 2030.
“Earlier this year, we hosted the largest ever business delegation from India to any country in the world. Now we’re building on that momentum by bringing a dynamic trade mission to India. If you’re a Canadian business looking to expand into one of the world’s most dynamic markets, I encourage you to apply to join me,” Sidhu said, as Global Affairs Canada, the country’s foreign ministry, opened the application process towards joining the delegation.
That fresh negotiations towards the CEPA will take place was announced when Prime Ministers Narendra Modi and Mark Carney met on the margins of the G20 Leaders’ Summit in Johannesburg, South Africa, in November 2025. They were officially launched when Carney, on his maiden visit to India as PM, held a bilateral with Modi in New Delhi this March.
The two PMs have set a deadline of the end of the year for concluding the negotiations.
They met again last month on the margins of the G7 Leaders’ Summit in Evian, France, and “expressed satisfaction” with the progress in the CEPA negotiations, according to a readout from the Canadian PMO at the time. That readout added they reaffirmed their “commitment to building a forward-looking strategic partnership.”
Both leaders said they want talks to conclude by the time the G20 Leaders’ Summit is held in Miami in December. Modi added in Evian that he will try and visit Canada before the end of this year.
