Coal duty seen to be delaying Oz trade pact

The government’s concern over duty-free import of coal under the proposed bilateral trade agreement with Australia is seen as the main reason for a delay in the announcement of an interim deal, which was to be the key element of the PM-level summit on Monday. While everything was going on smoothly and commerce minister Piyush Goyal and his counterpart Dan Tehan had last month set a 30-day deadline for their officials to clinch the early harvest scheme coal has caused a last-minute delay.