Experts from the Gaidar Institute Vladimir Sedalishchev, Alexander Firanchuk, and Dmitry Kuznetsov commented for Izvestia on the significant increase in Russian imports of cattle meat from India.
According to data from the Indian Ministry of Commerce and Industry, Russia purchased $84.4 mn worth of such meat in the first 10 months of 2025, which is almost three times more than in the same period in 2024 ($30 mn). Shrimp imports also grew by a third, to $134.6 mn. According to calculations by the Gaidar Institute, total trade with India is expected to hit $60- 65 bn by the end of the year, with Russian exports accounting for the lion's share ($55-60 bn).
Vladimir Sedalishchev, Expert at the Economic Policy Foundation, acknowledged the positive but limited effect of the new supplies: “The increase in meat supplies does diversify imports and even out the structure of trade, but only slightly and symbolically.” At the same time, he stressed that the basis of trade remains unchanged: “However, this does little to change the trade imbalance: the bulk of trade turnover is still generated by Russian supplies of oil and petroleum products to India.” The expert noted separately that the current volume of Russian imports from India (about $5.5 bn in 2024) is already quite comparable to trade with the EU.
Dmitry Kuznetsov, Researcher at the Gaidar Institute's International Trade Department, pointed out that the structural imbalance (exports from Russia exceed imports by tens of times) creates a systemic problem for the transition to settlements in national currencies. "The rupees earned need to be spent on something. Nevertheless, trade always grows gradually, and in the future we may see other items for which supplies from India to Russia will grow significantly," he said.
Alexander Firanchuk, Senior Researcher at the International Trade Department of the Gaidar Institute, stressed that such an imbalance is not an issue. "But in case of India, this creates risks with settlements caused by the peculiarities of the country's currency legislation. Thus, companies have good reason to fear a repeat of the situation with the inability to repatriate revenues that Russian oil companies faced in the recent past. Although there have been no reports of new cases of such “freezes” of funds recently, this settlement mechanism remains a subject of attention for businesses and regulators," the expert noted.
He also explained the threefold increase in meat supplies as a statistical effect: “By the end of 2025, the Russian market's share of total cattle meat exports from India will be about 2% of the total volume, but there are no official statistics yet. In such conditions, even a small absolute increase in supplies leads to sharp jumps in growth rate statistics.” Alexander Firanchuk added that the flexibility of frozen meat supplies as a commodity probably contributed to the rapid redistribution of flows to the Russian market.
In addition, the expert provided an important terminological clarification: “The slaughter of cows is prohibited for religious reasons, which, however, do not apply to buffalo. But in the international trade classification, their meat is included in the same category as ‘cattle meat’, and in the public sphere it is often generically referred to as beef, which creates terminological confusion.”
Experts see potential for increasing imports from India, which would gradually alleviate the problem. Vladimir Sedalishchev drew attention to prospects in agriculture, pharmaceuticals, chemistry, and localization of production, noting that cooperation in medicine is already underway through the supply of generics and pharmaceutical substances.
Dmitry Kuznetsov presented an expanded list of possible areas: "First, the import of auto components is promising for the Russian market. These include brake systems, suspension components, drive axles, transmission units, and other components. Secondly, the import of machine-building products and road construction equipment: diesel engines and their parts, excavators, loaders, and bulldozers. Thirdly, purchases of electrical engineering and electronics are possible. For example, static converters, telecommunications and network equipment, and electrical control panels. Imports from India of light industry products (clothing, leather shoes, textile packaging), agri-food products (coffee, sugar, fruits, and nuts), as well as consumer chemicals, cosmetics, and aromatic compositions also look promising.
Vladimir Sedalishchev believes that, given India's economic and demographic size, the Indian market has enormous potential for a wide range of Russian goods in the medium and long term. However, according to Dmitry Kuznetsov, this will not solve the problems of imbalance. “It is difficult to imagine that India's exports to Russia will grow enough in the medium term to balance Russian exports to India,” he said.