The Hindu Business Line : Indo-US trade meet next month

New Delhi, Dec. 30 The fifth Indo-US Economic Summit will be held in the capital on January 7 and 8, Dr Prasad Medury, Summit Chairman and Partner Amrop International, said here on Tuesday.

The theme of the summit would be ‘Looking Ahead: Consolidating Alliances.’

It would focus on infrastructure, nuclear energy, logistics and transportation, manufacturing, civil aviation and information technology.

The External Affairs Minister, Mr Pranab Mukherjee, has been invited to be the chief guest at the summit.

Billed as the flagship event of the Indo-American Chamber of Commerce (IACC), the Indo-US Economic Summit would bring together senior representatives from Indian and US administrations, public sector undertakings, multilateral and bilateral bodies besides the chief executives of Indian and American corporations.

Dr Medury said that the summit would deliberate on key information technology issues and talk about the innovative practices that both US companies in India and Indian companies looking abroad should be adopting in the context of the global economic slowdown.

Elaborating on the theme of the forthcoming summit, Mr S. Madhavan, Regional President of IACC, told Business Line that the summit would “look at how we are going to foster set of alliances given the incentives and imperatives today in the economy”.

While highlighting that global financial meltdown was one dimension to the “looking ahead” point, he also noted that equally the nuclear deal was also another dimension.

“The idea was can we look at what are all the positives. Of course there are some downsides. Essentially, the focus will be on what are the mutual sets of opportunities for Indian and US companies given the present state of economic affairs,” Mr Madhavan said.

He also pointed out that US investments in infrastructure, nuclear energy and logistics and transportation have been very poor. “We actually want to better understand why the US investments have not happened in these areas. The opportunities are significant for both Indian and US companies in these areas,” Mr Madhavan said.

Though US companies have been manufacturing in India for long time, he pointed out that US FDI footprint in manufacturing is nothing to write home about. “The challenge is therefore what we can do to scale up our attractiveness from an US company standpoint. Simplify, match china from an FDI perspective. There is no comparison.”

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