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The Fourth Meeting of the India-Argentina Joint Trade Committee was held on 24 August 2026 at Palacio San Martin, Buenos Aires.
India's delegation was led by Commerce Secretary Rajesh Agrawal; Argentina's by Ambassador Fernando Brun, Secretary for International Economic Relations.
Bilateral trade crossed USD 6.5 billion in 2025, growing at over 17% a year, and India is now Argentina's fifth-largest trading partner.
Talks covered lithium and critical minerals, pharmaceuticals and regulatory recognition, agricultural market access, and space, aviation, telecom and digital services.
An India-Argentina Business Forum followed on 25 August 2026, with the largest Indian business delegation yet to visit Argentina - more than 25 business leaders.
Argentina occupies the southern part of South America and is the continent's second-largest country. It borders five countries - Chile to the south and west, Bolivia and Paraguay to the north, and Brazil and Uruguay to the east - and is bounded by the South Atlantic Ocean to the east and the Drake Passage to the south. Its landmass falls into four topographical regions: the Andean region along the western spine, the Pampas grasslands at the centre, the Patagonian plateau in the south and the Gran Chaco in the north. The climate is mostly temperate, arid in the southeast and subantarctic in the southwest. Major rivers are the Parana, the Paraguay and the Uruguay; principal lakes include Mar Chiquita and Lake Argentino. The highest point is Cerro Aconcagua, at about 6,961 metres the highest peak in the Americas and in the Southern Hemisphere. The northeast holds rainforest and the Iguazu Falls, on the border with Brazil. Natural resources include lead, zinc, tin, copper, iron ore, manganese, petroleum, uranium and, most consequentially for India, lithium.
The Southern Common Market, created by the Treaty of Asuncion in 1991 with founding members Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay, headquartered in Montevideo. India's PTA is with the bloc, not with Argentina alone, which is why widening it needs all members on board.
Argentina, Bolivia and Chile together hold a very large share of global lithium resources, held in brine beneath high-altitude salt flats. India's critical-minerals strategy - the National Critical Mineral Mission and KABIL's overseas acquisitions - runs through this region.
Khanij Bidesh India Limited, a joint venture of NALCO, Hindustan Copper Limited and Mineral Exploration and Consultancy Limited, mandated to acquire strategic mineral assets abroad. Its Catamarca lithium blocks in Argentina are its most advanced overseas project.
A standing bilateral mechanism at secretary level that reviews market access, tariff and non-tariff barriers and investment. Compare the similar JTC and Joint Commission mechanisms India runs with several partners; the numbering of the meeting is a common prelims detail.
GS Paper 2 > International relations: bilateral agreements and groupings affecting India's interests; GS Paper 1 > World geography, South America
General Awareness > World geography and international affairs
General Awareness > Bilateral trade and trade agreements
General Awareness > Current events and world geography
A bilateral, secretary-level mechanism that reviews trade, market access and investment issues between two countries.
An agreement granting reciprocal tariff concessions on a listed set of products, narrower than a free trade agreement, which covers substantially all trade.
The Argentina-Bolivia-Chile region whose salt-flat brines hold a very large share of the world's lithium resources.
A document certifying where goods were produced, needed to claim preferential tariffs; both sides discussed moving to digital certificates.
The fertile temperate grassland plain of central Argentina, the base of its grain and cattle economy.