India-Netherlands Business Forum Co-Chaired by Piyush Goyal

India's economic outreach in Europe moved a step further on 26 October 2026, when Union Minister of Commerce and Industry Piyush Goyal spent a second day in the Netherlands meeting Dutch ministers, lawmakers and company chiefs. The Press Information Bureau put out an account of the day on 27 October 2026. One theme ran through every appointment: turning the concluded India-European Union Free Trade Agreement into orders, investment and supply-chain links.

Who the Minister met

Three names stand out from the day's government meetings. Sjoerd Sjoerdsma holds the Dutch portfolio of Foreign Trade and Development Cooperation. Heleen Herbert is the Minister of Economic Affairs and Climate. Arthur van Dijk serves as King's Commissioner of the Province of North Holland, the office through which the Dutch crown is represented in that province. Away from the executive, the Minister sat with members of two legislative panels: the committee of the House of Representatives that handles foreign trade and development cooperation, and the Senate's committee on European affairs. There the conversation widened from bilateral commerce to India's economic partnership with the European Union as a whole.

India-Netherlands Business Forum

The centrepiece of the day was the India-Netherlands Business Forum, which Goyal chaired jointly with Sjoerdsma. Roughly 200 people attended, a large share of them senior figures from Indian and Dutch industry. Speakers returned repeatedly to the openings created by the India-EU trade pact: wider market access, stronger investment partnerships and a closer stitching together of the supply chains that run between India and Europe. The case made at the Forum was that the two economies complement rather than compete with each other, and that it is contact between industries, not paperwork between governments, that converts a signed agreement into real business.

Boardroom meetings

Goyal also held one-to-one talks with chief executives of several large Dutch firms, whose businesses span logistics and retail, electronics and semiconductor technology, energy and industrial solutions. A separate roundtable brought together the top management of 15 Dutch companies; it was arranged by India's Embassy in The Hague together with HSBC Netherlands, and ranged over investment plans, commercial tie-ups and the business climate on both sides.

Why the Netherlands matters

Speaking to the media, the Minister pointed to two developments that have quickened the relationship: the raising of India-Netherlands ties to a Strategic Partnership, and the conclusion of the India-EU Free Trade Agreement. With its ports and distribution networks, the Netherlands is treated by Indian exporters as a gateway into the wider European market, which is why Dutch capital and Dutch logistics weigh heavily in India's Europe strategy.