"While Indian companies will have to start thinking in terms of dealing in the euro, the new market will present the country with new funding choices," Prada said.

The euro, to be launched next January, will create a more efficient European economy and change the international monetary system/relations. "The size of the euro area, stability orientation of its policy framework and the integration of its financial markets will make it one of the dominant world currencies," Prada said.

The European Union, which accounts for 20 per cent of the total world trade, is India's largest trading partner with over 25 per cent exports and imports. The changes will, therefore, impact the country, he added.

The EU is also undergoing other changes, including its enlargement byincorporating countries from central and eastern Europe. Prada said it would continue to promote free and fair trade. Anti-dumping moves, he said, are not taken by the union on its own, but based on evidence by European industries of unfair trade practices by exporting nations detrimental to local producers.

On the impact of anti-dumping on certain Indian exports and generalised system of preferences on EU-India trade relations, Prada said, GSP is a unilateral mechanism put in place by EU to accord preferential access to the community market for products from developing countries.

He said the Council of EU Chambers, which is promoting EU-India trade, has been chosen as the main organiser of the EU-India partenariat to be held in Delhi next March. "The biggest-ever Indo-European business meeting to be organised in India will bring around 800 Indian and European companies from six industrial sectors," Prada added.