The Hindu Business Line : UK cos keen to invest in services sector

Bilateral trade between India and the UK is expected to go up from $16 billion to $60 billion by 2020, according to Sir Richard Stagg, British High Commissioner in India.

British companies are also keen to invest in select sectors of Indian industry, such as services, banking and insurance, retail, energy, infrastructure, food processing and automotive components, he said, while speaking to reporters accompanying him on a visit to the Sundarbans, where he went on Sunday to oversee a climate change initiative that is being supported by the British Government.

Sir Richard said the Indo-UK bilateral trade was growing in double-digits year-on-year.

“Trade grows faster than the economy. If the Indian economy grows at 9-10 per cent on a sustainable basis, bilateral trade between the UK and India is expected to grow at 10-20 per cent per annum. If that happens, I expect bilateral trade to touch $60 billion by 2020,” he said.

Balanced trade

The balance of trade is “fairly even” at the moment and Britain would not “lose much sleep even if there is a slight imbalance”, he said.

Sir Richard said British companies are keen to invest in the services sector here and partake in the growth opportunities in other sectors such as banking and insurance, retail, energy, infrastructure, food processing and automotive components.

Companies like British Gas are keen to invest in India even as several UK-based retail majors are waiting to be part of the growing retail sector in India. The infrastructure sector also holds “great potential for investment by British companies”.

He said the UK has a very vibrant retail sector and British companies would be keen to partake in the growth opportunities in the country’s retail space.

He presented a case for “good retailers with good logistics support” in food retail and said this would go a long way in reducing the amount of food products that are wasted owing to lack of appropriate logistics support or processing facilities. However, before that can happen, several political issues would need to be resolved.

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