What India's trade deals change for café and bakery supply — and what they don't

India's in-force trade agreements reduce duties on some café ingredients and on the equipment. Dairy and cheese are excluded. What changes, what does not, and the food-import gates an importer still has to clear.

7 min read · updated 2026-09-19

Only in-force deals change what an importer pays

Three of India's recent agreements are in force for goods: UK–India CETA (in force 15 July 2026), India–EFTA TEPA (in force 1 October 2025) and India–Australia ECTA (in force 29 December 2022) (s1; s2; s3). New Zealand's agreement is signed but not yet in force (s4), and the EU's agreement was concluded on 27 January 2026 but is not signed or in force (s5). A deal that is not in force does not change the duty at the border today, whatever its schedule promises. Read the rest of this article against the agreements that are actually in force, or against the date the agreement you care about starts.

Dairy and cheese: not part of the deals

Across the agreements in force or on the table, dairy is the consistent exclusion. India protected dairy products, cereals, millets, edible oils, oilseeds, apples and several vegetable products in the UK agreement (s1), and it protected processed food, dairy, soya, coal and sensitive agricultural products in the EFTA agreement (s2). India did not open its dairy market to New Zealand: that agreement provides a fast-track route for dairy ingredients used in further manufacturing and export, and a commitment to consult New Zealand if India ever offers dairy access to comparable partners (s4). In the EU agreement, Borderlex reported that India offered no concessions on most dairy products, along with many fruits, vegetables, spices and cut flowers (s6). So mozzarella, feta, butter and cream are not made cheaper by these deals; a café's cheese bill is a different story from its machinery bill.

What the in-force deals do cover

For the UK, the government's conclusion summary says fresh and frozen salmon and cod, and lamb, become eligible for tariff-free entry at entry into force, while chocolate, gingerbread, sweet biscuits and soft drinks are staged to tariff-free over ten years, and whisky and gin get staged cuts (s7). For EFTA, India lists processed food among the sensitive sectors it protected; the processed-agricultural concessions in TEPA are EFTA's, on Indian exports, so a Swiss or Norwegian food line has to be checked in India's schedule before any preference is assumed (s2). For Australia, India's offer covers the majority of its tariff lines and India's own release names wines among the Australian lines it covers, while the commerce minister said sensitive agricultural products and dairy were protected (s3). None of this is automatic: the importer claims the preference with proof of origin, and the rate depends on the line, so check the schedule for your product rather than a product description (s7; s2; s3).

The strongest FTA case in a café is the equipment

An espresso machine, a grinder, a deck oven, a proofer or a blast chiller is machinery, classified in the tariff schedule's machinery chapters rather than as an article of food (s8). That matters twice over. First, the food-import gates below do not apply to it: a machine needs no FSSAI importer licence, no shelf-life calculation and no plant quarantine (s9). Second, the duty on it follows the machinery line in the relevant schedule — India's CETA schedule for a UK-origin machine (s10), and India's TEPA schedule for a Swiss-origin one (s4). For a café or bakery, equipment is a single high-value purchase per site, while ingredients are a recurring, perishable, regulated supply chain. If you sell both, treat them as two different businesses.

The food-import gates that remain

For any article of food, an Indian importer must hold a valid import licence from FSSAI's Central Licensing Authority, and the consignment must meet India's labelling requirements and other FSSAI regulations (s9). The FSS (Import) Regulations 2017 require a valid remaining shelf life of at least 60% or three months before expiry, whichever is less, at the time of import clearance (s11). Fresh plant produce also goes through plant quarantine and needs a phytosanitary certificate (s9). None of these gates is changed by a trade agreement: a duty line can be eliminated and the product still be un-importable without the licence, the label and the shelf life.

Cafés buy through importers and distributors

Because the import licence sits with the importer, a café rarely imports directly; it buys through an importer or a distributor. India's food-service supply platforms are built on that model: Hyperpure, Eternal's B2B food-service supply business, reports serving more than 100,000 outlets in FY25 from 11 warehouses across India (s12). For an exporter, the practical Indian customer for ingredients is therefore an importer, a distributor or a chain's procurement team — not an individual café — and the first question is whether they are licensed to import your product.

What this means in practice

Equipment: check the machinery line in the schedule for the agreement your goods originate under, and remember that the preferential rate only applies once that agreement is in force. Ingredients: dairy and cheese are not part of these deals, the food lines that are covered depend on the product and the agreement, and tariff access is only half the story — the importer's licence, the label, the shelf life and quarantine come first. This article carries no rates for a reason: the rate for your line lives in the schedule, verified line by line, with the date you checked it.

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