In­dia, SA to bond at sum­mit

The New Age (Gauteng) - - BUSINESS - THELMA NGOMA thel­man@the­newage.co.za

THERE are more than 130 In­dian com­pa­nies in South Africa with an in­vest­ment of ap­prox­i­mately $8bn, (R96bn) em­ploy­ing ap­prox­i­mately 18 000 South Africans,” ac­cord­ing to In­dian of­fi­cials.

Min­is­ter of Com­merce and In­dus­try Suresh Prabhu said his coun­try and South Africa shared a valu­able strate­gic part­ner­ship.

On the back of this re­la­tion­ship, South Africa will be host­ing the In­dia-South Africa Busi­ness Sum­mit.

Trade and In­dus­try Min­is­ter Rob Davies said that even though South Africa’s to­tal in­vest­ment in In­dia had in­creased to R10.3bn in 2017 from R1.4bn in 2003, a lot needed to be done to in­crease in­vest­ments and cre­ate jobs in both coun­tries.

“Be­tween Jan­uary 2003 and Septem­ber last year, South Africa recorded a to­tal of 29 foreign direct in­vest­ment (FDI) pro­jects to In­dia.

These pro­jects rep­re­sent a to­tal cap­i­tal in­vest­ment of R10.3bn, which is an av­er­age in­vest­ment of nearly R359m. Dur­ing that pe­riod a to­tal of 5 871 jobs were cre­ated,” Davies said.

The De­part­ment of Trade and In­dus­try (DTI) will host the busi­ness sum­mit in part­ner­ship with the High Com­mis­sion of In­dia, the Min­istry of Com­merce and In­dus­try of In­dia, In­vest In­dia, the Con­fed­er­a­tion of In­dian In­dus­try and the Fed­er­a­tion of In­dian Cham­bers of Com­merce and In­dus­try.

The sum­mit seeks to max­imise the po­ten­tial of eco­nomic and com­mer­cial part­ner­ship be­tween the two coun­tries by lev­er­ag­ing both the In­vest SA’s and In­vest In­dia’s ini­tia­tives.

South Africa views its re­la­tion­ship with In­dia as a strate­gic one.

The two-day sum­mit, which gets un­der­way on April 29, will open with a din­ner and a trib­ute to former pres­i­dent Nel­son Mandela and In­dia icon Ma­hatma Gandhi, ar­ranged by Unicef’s good­will am­bas­sador Gavin Ra­jah.

The Con­fed­er­a­tion of In­dian In­dus­try and the Fed­er­a­tion of In­dian Cham­bers of Com­merce and In­dus­try will lead busi­ness del­e­ga­tions from In­dia to the aus­pi­cious event.

Com­pa­nies from both coun­tries will pro­vide ex­hi­bi­tion booths at the Sand­ton Con­ven­tion Cen­tre and busi­nessto-busi­ness meet­ings for in­ter­ested com­pa­nies will be fa­cil­i­tated on site.

Both Prabhu and Davies are ex­pected to de­liver the key­note ad­dresses.

The sum­mit will also see the par­tic­i­pa­tion of Gaut­eng Pre­mier David Makhura as well as min­is­ters, CEOs and in­dus­try spe­cial­ists from both South Africa and In­dia.

This year marks a sig­nif­i­cant year in South Africa/In­dia re­la­tions, be­ing the 25th year of the es­tab­lish­ment of diplo­matic re­la­tions.

PIC­TURE: GETTY IM­AGES

KEY IN­VESTOR: In­dian Min­is­ter of Com­merce and In­dus­try Suresh Prabhu says his coun­try and SA share a valu­able strate­gic part­ner­ship.

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