Workshop on Scope of
Indian Services to Africa
Africa is considered a high return export destination for FDI and India should take advantage of this, says India Programme Coordinator at UNCTAD’s New Delhi office Dr. Ms. Veena Jha. Addressing a Workshop organized by FIEO on 6th March 2007 at New Delhi on ‘Scope of Indian Services to Africa,’ she said India’s output FDI to Africa was mainly restricted to Mauritius and Sudan in sectors like energy, mineral and manufacturing whereas its services related FDI was confined to South Africa in the field of telecom. She felt that there was a need to explore the scope of Indian services in other potential sectors such as telecom, transportation, tourism, health services, power transmission and education, etc.
Dr. Jha further said that the increased presence of Indian capital could improve balance of payments situation in Africa and Indian services sector could help African countries reduce transaction cost, generate employment and create new industries. According to her, despite pessimism in global trade talks, Africa’s trade in services was growing fast. "African exports of commercial services jumped 46% during 2003-2005. Exports rose from US$39 bn to US$ 57 bn for transport, travel, business, professional and other services during this period." She informed. The UNCTAD official felt that Africa could benefit from globalization if it reduced transaction cost by improved physical infrastructure, human capital infrastructure, legal and information infrastructure.
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Dr. R K Dhawan, Chairman, FIEO (NR) (extreme right) addressing the meet. On his right are, H.E. Dr. Mohamed Higaze, Ambassador, Embassy of Egypt; Mr. Subhash Mittal, Convenor, FIEO Committee on International Trade & Export Promotion; Mr. Enbali, Counselor, Embassy of Ethiopia; and Mr. Ajay Sahai, Director General, FIEO. |
Egyptian Ambassador to India Dr. Mohamed Higaze in his address at the Workshop pointed out that there was a good scope of cooperation in tourism, construction, health and railways between Egypt and India. He said tourism and construction industries in Egypt were growing very rapidly and India could join hands with Egypt in these sectors. The Ambassador informed that the Tourism Minister of Egypt would be visiting India with a large delegation during April this year for exploring the possibilities of bilateral cooperation in this sector.
Wooing Indian investments in Egypt, the Ambassador explained how new investment laws and government regulations had eased foreign investment flows into Egypt. He also explained that Egypt enjoyed a wide range of market assess to North America, China, Europe and Middle-east and its central location to the three continents of Europe, Asia and Africa could help bring in rich dividends to foreign investments in his country.
While welcoming the participants to the Workshop, the Northern Region Chairman of FIEO, Dr. R. K. Dhawan said that India’s trade in services had increased significantly during the last few years. "Our services export has more than doubled from US$ 25 bn. in 2003-04 to US$ 60 bn. in 2005-06 and currently accounts for 37% of our total exports. The Indian services sector grew at over 10% and services exports at over 20% in 2005-06 and today accounts for about 55% of India’s GDP." said Dr. Dhawan. He pointed out that the success of Indian service industry was primarily driven by the excellence achieved by the country in the areas like IT and beyond IT enabled services. He further highlighted that India offered first-rate educational and training facilities in engineering, medical sciences, law, finance, management, consultancy, etc. besides world-class medical and healthcare facility at substantially low cost.
Earlier, the Director General of FIEO, Mr. Ajay Sahai while initiating the meeting had mentioned that Indian services sector was assuming significant importance in the current economic scenario. He felt enthused that developing countries like India, China were now figuring among the top service exporters in the world, he felt.
Mr. V K Gauba, Dy. Secretary, Ministry of Commerce during his address pointed out how the Government was increasingly placing more emphasis on the services sector in view of its rising contribution to the GDP. He informed that the Government was setting up an exclusive export promotion council for the services sector to boost services export from the country. As says Mr. Gauba, the council will cover 13 main sectors.
The Chief General Manager of Exim Bank, Mr Sunil Trikha informed that his bank played a pivotal role in promoting and financing project exports especially in civil engineering, construction, consultancy services, capital goods and transport vehicles. He said that during the last two decades increasing number of contracts had been secured by the Indian companies in Sub-Saharan Africa, North Africa, West Asia, etc. and such projects had supplemented the efforts of host governments in achieving their developmental objectives. Exim Bank is said to be providing lines of credit to enable import of Indian equipment, technology and services on deferred credit terms. According to the Bank sources, currently 41 lines of credit are in operation in Africa amounting to US$ 2 bn.
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Dr. R K Wadhwa, Asstt. Professor of Indian Institute of Foreign Trade (IIFT) during his presentation informed that the word trade and services had grown faster than world merchandise trade since 1980 and India ranked 10th among leading exporters in world trade of commercial services in the year 2005 having a 2.8 % share in world’s export in services. He observed that India could help Africa in sectors like IT, telecom, higher education, engineering & maintenance, health care, hospitality, etc |
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A view of the participants. |
Dr Anju Banerjee, CMD, EdCil (Educational Consultant India Limited) informed about the role of EdCil in facilitating human resource development in diverse fields and said EdCil had offered technical assistance on African Development Bank funded projects in Africa.
Mr. Subhash Mittal, Convenor, FIEO Committee on International Trade & Export Promotion while proposing the vote of thanks observed that services sector directly influenced health, education, and employment indices of a country and was therefore crucial for a balanced economic development.
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South African lawmaker asks Indian exporters to target FIFA World Cup 2010 South African lawmaker Ms Farida Mahomed has advised Indian exporters to target FIFA World Cup 2010 to be held in South Africa. Ms Mahomed, a third time Member of South African Parliament says the event provides a very good opportunity for Indian exporters to get into the South African market where sports goods like T-shirts, soccer balls, mufflers, souvenirs, mementos, gifts, etc are likely to be in great demand. Ms Mahomed is on the Committee of Trade & Industry, Science & Technology, Foreign Affairs in South Africa. In a meeting with the FIEO Convenor of the Committee on International Trade & Export Promotion Mr. Subhash Mittal on March 16, 2007 at Niryat Bhawan in New Delhi, Ms. Mahomed also said that with the infrastructure work for the World Cup in progress, there was also a scope for export of high quality low
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