Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday pitched for higher foreign investment in India. He listed sectors such as health care, civil aviation, defence and space beside others for investment opportunities.

“It has never been such a best time to invest in India,” Modi said while addressing India Ideas Summit hosted by the US-India Business Council (USIBC). He highlighted the fact that India has attracted foreign investment of more than 20 billion dollars between April and July this year He underlined that each year, India is reaching record highs in FDI, adding that FDI inflows in India in 2019-20 were 74 billion dollars, which is an increase of 20 per cent over the previous year. He highlighted that even during the pandemic, India had attracted foreign investment of more than 20 billion dollars between April and July this year.

“When the markets are open when the opportunity is high, and the options are many, can optimism be far behind. You can see the confidence when India rises in key business ratings, mainly the Ease of Doing Business ratings of the World Bank,” he said.

Citing a recent report, he informed that there are more rural internet users than urban internet users. Hailing India as a land of opportunities, he said there are about half a billion active internet users in the country now, while there are over half a billion more people who are being connected. He also mentioned opportunities in the frontier technologies of 5G, Big Data analytics, Quantum Computing, Block-chain and Internet of Things.

He talked about the historic reforms recently undertaken in the agriculture sector and said that there are opportunities to invest in areas including agriculture inputs and machinery, agriculture supply chain, food processing sector, fisheries and organic produce. Noting that the healthcare sector in India is growing faster than 22 per cent every year and the progress of Indian companies in the production of medical-technology, telemedicine and diagnostics, he said that now is the best time to expand investment in the Indian healthcare sector.

Prime Minister listed several other sectors which offer tremendous opportunities to invest, viz. the energy sector; infrastructure creation including building houses, roads, highways and ports; civil aviation, wherein top private Indian airlines plan to include over a thousand new aircraft over the coming decade, thus opening up the opportunity for any investor who chooses to set up manufacturing facilities in India, and also through setting up of Maintenance Repair and Operations facilities.

He mentioned that India is raising the FDI cap for investment in the defence sector to 74 per cent, two defence corridors have been established to encourage the production of defence equipment and platforms and added that special incentives are offered for private and foreign investors. He also mentioned path-breaking reforms being undertaken in the space sector.

Inviting investment in finance and insurance, Prime Minister said that India had raised the FDI cap for investment in insurance to 49 per cent and 100 per cent FDI is permitted for investment in insurance intermediaries. He noted that there are large untapped opportunities for increasing insurance cover in health, agriculture, business and life insurance.

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