In a move that could finally check India’s widening trade deficit with China, the Chinese Ambassador to India Luo Zhaohui has said that Beijing will reduce or cancel tariffs on imports of 8,549 types of goods from India, South Korea, Bangladesh, Laos and Sri Lanka.

New Delhi, however, is not celebrating yet with Commerce Ministry officials saying that they would prefer to first look at the official communication when it comes and examine the fine-print to see if regulatory restrictions have also been relaxed.

“The goods (on which tariff will be reduced or cancelled) include chemicals, agricultural & medical products, soyabean, clothing, steel and aluminium products,” Zhaohui tweeted on Wednesday.

The Chinese Ambassador added that this was good news as it will help reduce trade imbalance (with China’s trade partners).

India’s trade deficit with China widened to a whopping $62.8 billion in 2017-18 from $51 billion a year before. This accounted for more than a third of India’s total trade deficit.

With the Trump administration in the US turning aggressive towards many of its trade partners, especially China, Beijing has been making additional efforts to improve its relationship with India. Chinese Trade Minister Zhong Shan visited India in March , after a long gap, and agreed to take concrete steps to address the growing trade imbalance by giving more market access to Indian goods.

Beijing has already agreed to import certain quantities of raw sugar from India and also announced reduction of import tariffs on soyabean to zero per cent from 3 per cent.

“We are aware of China’s State Council’s recent announcement of certain concessions to imports from India, South Korea, Bangladesh, Laos and Sri Lanka, but we do not know if it would apply to 8,549 products. We have to wait for the official notification,” the official said. New Delhi is also keen that Beijing focuses on removing regulatory and administrative hurdles in addition to cutting down tariffs. “India has not been able to export a number of farm products including buffalo meat and soybean to China because of sanitary & phytosanitary restrictions. In pharmaceuticals and IT, too, Indian companies have not been able to access the vast Chinese market due to administrative issues,” the official said.