The Hindu Business Line : `US reiterates commitment on business in Bengal'

THE US commitment to doing business in West Bengal continues and is again growing as part of a comprehensive engagement with India, which concluded during the Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh's "successful" visit to the US in July 2005.

This was observed by the US Consul General in Kolkata, Mr V. Jardine.

Addressing a meeting on "Indo-US commercial relation-foreign partnership in 21st century," organised here on Wednesday by the Bengal National Chamber of Commerce & Industry (BNCCI), Mr Jardine said the US trade with West Bengal was not something new. The trade relationship with the Bengali traders dated back to over two hundred years from the arrival of the first merchant ship — The Washington — in 1787.

He said, "We at the Consulate have been seeing growing US business presence in this State. Just last week I met with the CEO of Acclaris, a US accounting company, as he was inaugurating his firm's new offices here in the city. The CEO was positive about the potential of doing business here and is likely to expand his operations. The previous month, we saw the opening of IT communication company IXIA. And I understand other established US businesses are also growing."

Mr Jardine said that the big-name US businesses already operating in the State covered IBM and Intel in the IT sector. The presence of American Express, Bank of America and Citibank in the banking sector could be felt along with the accounting firm such as PricewaterhouseCoopers and KPMG International.

In the food sector, Coca-Cola, PepsiCo and Frito-Lay have all made significant investments and recently announced plans to expand operations in the State.

The close business relationship is also being mirrored in military and strategic partnership.

He felt that the recently concluded COPE-India exercise at the State's Kalaikunda air base was an important step in the growing cooperation between air forces of the two countries.

As India considers its decision to purchase 126 fighter airplanes, he saw a significant economic impact for this region as a potential purchase of a US aircraft could provide over a billion dollars in contract set aside for India businesses.

He said that China was far superior to India in infrastructure sector.

Since modern infrastructure was a pre-requisite to attractfresh investment and also for the continued growth of the country's economy, the global partnership between the two countries could promote India's infrastructure sector.

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