March 06, 2006
President George W. Bush, left, with Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh during mating
VOYEURS OF AMERICA
Economic cooperation was a major topic during the recent visit of President Bush to India, with the United States agreeing to an ambitious three-year target for doubling trade. A delegation of top American business executives also accompanied the president, keen to explore investment opportunities in one of the world's fastest-growing economies.
As the president visited India, U.S. Trade Representative Rob Portman accepted a challenge from his Indian counterpart (Trade Minister Kamal Nath) to push bilateral trade to $50 billion in three instead of five years, as earlier targeted. Bilateral trade stood at over $28 billion last year.
The optimism is based on the growing interest among American businesses in India's vibrant economy.
The head of the financial services company JP Morgan Chase, William Harrison, co-chairs a forum of 20 major American and Indian companies that is outlining a plan to boost commercial collaboration.
Harrison says U.S.-based multinationals see India as an important destination as it catches up with the other booming economy in the region - China. "You can't be a global CEO (Chief Executive Officer) today, doing your job and not really focusing on how you can do business in India. You just can't be. And, by the way, a lot of people love to compare China and India. It is not an 'either-or.' I think for most big multinational companies, you have got to be looking at both of them because they are both right at the top of the list of where you have got to be to do business in the future," he said.
Dozens of U.S. businesses already have a foothold in India. Technology companies Microsoft and Cisco have invested billions of dollars developing research centers in India to use its pool of skilled talent.
Other multinationals are targeting India's 300 million middle-class consumers, who buy Levis jeans, aspire to own a Ford car, and frequent McDonalds and Pizza Hut outlets.
And the American defense industry wants to sell warplanes and high-tech weapons to India as the political relationship between the two nations enters a new phase.
Indian Finance Minister P. Chidambaram told the visiting business executives the country wants more U.S. investment, especially to revamp its overburdened infrastructure. "For the U.S. side it means a great opportunity, an opportunity to invest in India, in our roads, our rail network, or airports and seaports, to use your acknowledged strengths in the financial sector and invest in our insurance sector and banking sector," he said.
But American businesses say India has to liberalize more rapidly, especially in fast-growing services such as banking, insurance and retail, if U.S. investment there is to reach its potential.
JP Morgan Chase Chairman Harrison identifies other factors that intimidate American businesses thinking of increasing their stake in India. "It is infrastructure first, lack of infrastructure, and secondly the perception, real or not, of the bureaucracy, of doing business here; whether that is getting permits to do business, or getting licenses; whether it is the delay in the court system to settle contract disputes or whatever it is, there is a perception there that we think [all this] could be facilitated [speeded up]," he said.
The Indian-American business forum has several recommendations for removing obstacles to cooperation. These include speeding up infrastructure development in India, making Bombay a regional hub for the financial operations of U.S. companies, and increasing cooperation between top technical institutes.
Posted by bhola at 09:11 AM | Comments (0)
March 04, 2006
Bush visit to India: nuclear weapons and terrorism on the agenda, but no room for social justice
BILL CLINTON’S visit to India in 2000 was, by all accounts, fun. The President frolicked with peasant women while being showered with flower petals, bought three carpets with his Visa card, toured the Taj Mahal and marvelled at ceremonial elephants and Bengal tigers.
When George Bush arrives today, however, there will be room for little but work. A planeload of America’s top chief executive officers will not be far behind him for a trip that is all about forging closer economic relations between the world’s two largest democracies.
Optimism was mounting before their arrival that the two countries would sign a deal designed to legitimise India’s civil nuclear programme, allowing the world’s largest democracy to buy nuclear technology and fuel despite concern over its weapons programme.
Mr Bush has already indicated — slightly wistfully — that there will be no sightseeing around the Taj Mahal. Instead there will be meetings with the country’s leading politicians and the CEO Forum, established last year by US and Indian companies.
Although US trade with India lags far behind that with China it is expanding rapidly: exports to India rose by more than 30 per cent last year while Indian exports to America have grown sixfold since 1985 to $13 billion (£7.4 billion). More than half of the Fortune 500 list of major US companies have out-sourced some of their information technology work to India, where the economy has enjoyed growth rates of 7 per cent for the past four years.
The Bush Administration has recognised the strategic importance of an alliance with India, an Asian democracy with 150 million Muslims.
The nuclear deal with Manmohan Singh, the Indian Prime Minister, could be worth upwards of $20 billion (£11.4 billion). The proposals were floated after the two met in Washington last July when Mr Bush promised to pass legislation allowing civilian nuclear technology to be shared with India if it separated its civilian and military programmes.
India, which has an acute energy shortage, would open its civilian nuclear plants to international observers. Its weapons programme would be legitimised even though the country has not signed the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.
“I’m reasonably confident it’s going to happen,” K. Subrahmanyam, the head of the National Security Council Advisory Board — an expert panel for the Indian Government — told reporters in Delhi.
“Neither can afford not to have an agreement,” he said.
The deal would go some way towards easing concerns over India’s acquisition of nuclear weapons. US Administration officials now talk about securing a “mutual vision for defence security”.
They are mindful not only of India’s proximity to Afghanistan and Iraq, but also its global position in relation to China — which represents the greatest threat to America’s economic and military hegemony.
William Cohen, the former US Defence Secretary, now CEO of the Cohen Group, who is among 25 business leaders visiting India, said: “India and the US are on an important and historic journey for the future. Close strategic co-operation and defence security tiers between the countries will be an important element in determining the success or failure of that journey in an ever more complicated and dangerous world.”
He is among 25 CEOs travelling to India this week for the business summit. Among the blue chip American companies represented in Delhi will be MetLife, Honeywell International, American International Group, Dow Chemical, Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch, Pfizer and Continental Airlines.
The CEO Forum, led by William Harrison, the chairman of JP Morgan Chase, is expected to push for the lifting of restrictions on technology transfers, a mechanism for resolving trade disputes — especially on intellectual property rights — and the liberalisation of India’s financial sector.
Most of the opposition to the nuclear pact and Mr Bush’s presence in India comes from the Left and Muslim groups. More than a thousand Islamic protesters took to the streets of India’s financial capital, Bombay, yesterday shouting anti- American slogans. The Communist Party of India said it expected at least 50,000 people to demonstrate outside Parliament when Mr Singh and Mr Bush meet tomorrow.
Posted by bhola at 07:26 AM | Comments (0)
Dow Chairman joins Bush in India
TIMES NEWS NETWORK[ MONDAY, FEBRUARY 27, 2006 12:18:40 AM]
NEW DELHI: Call it convergence of business and politics. Even as US President George Bush lands in Delhi later this week, a high-profile delegation of 25 CEOs are also zooming in on the capital. This A team comprises members from the largest US corporations, Indian companies as well as Indian Americans.
Among CEOs who will be in Delhi with the presidential mission are Paul Hanrahan, president, CEO and director, AES Corporation; Robert H Benmosche, chairman & CEO MetLife; William Cohen, former US secretary of defence and chairman and CEO, The Cohen Group; David Cote, chairman & CEO, Honeywell International; Harold McGraw, chairman, president & CEO, McGraw Hill; Martin J. Sullivan, president and CEO of American International Group; Andrew N Liveris, chairman and CEO of Dow Chemical; Patricia F. Russo, chairman & CEO, Lucent Technologies; Stephen A. Schwarzman/ Peter Peterson, senior chairman and CEO of the Blackstone Group & John A. Thain, CEO, NYSE.
The list also includes Henry Paulson, chairman & CEO, Goldman Sachs; James Quigley, vice chairman, Merrill Lynch; Hemendra Kothari, partner of Merrill Lynch in India; Lakshmi Narayanan, president & CEO Cognizant Technologies; Lawrence Killner, chairman & CEO/Jeffery Smisek, president, Continental Airlines; Henry A McKinnell Jr, chairman & CEO, Pfizer and Jerry Speyer, president & CEO, Tishman-Speyer.
US industry appreciates the business acumen and dynamism of India, its extraordinary talent pool and the discipline of a committed work ethic," said Ron Somers, president of United States-India Business Council (USIBC), the organisation which is bringing the CEOs together in India.
It is heartening that our governments are making it a priority to encourage and foster convergence of these two powerful economies and the alignment of two great democracies," said Ron Somers, president of United States-India Business Council (USIBC), the organisation which is bringing the CEOs together in India.
He arrived in Delhi this weekend, ahead of the Presidential visit. Heena Jhaveri, director, USIBC and Daniel W. Christman from US Chamber of Commerce are also part of the USIBC team.
While USIBC, which has a membership of 176 of the largest US companies investing in India, has been working towards greater trade ties between the two countries, some of the team members also belong to the high-powered CEOs Forum which was launched last year when Prime Minister Manmohan Singh visited Washington DC.
The CEO Forum, which has an official engagement scheduled with the US President in Delhi, was supported by the Bush Administration and brings together 10 US blue-chip companies with 10 outstanding Indian ones.
Prominent USIBC board members include Scott Bayman president & CEO General Electric India; Sanjay Bhatnagar, chairman & CEO, THOT Capital; PC Chatterjee, president, The Chatterjee Group; Dinesh Keskar, president, Aircraft Trading SVP, sales, The Boeing Company; Pavan Nigam, chairman & CEO, Cendura Corporation; Dinesh Paliwal, chairman and CEO, ABB Inc. Americas; Raj Rajadhyaksha, chairman & CEO, DLZ Corporation; Nikhil Sinha, president & CEO, eMR Technology Ventures; Dilip R. Vellodi, chairman & CEO, The Sutherland Group and Frank Wisner, vice-chairman, American International Group.
Posted by bhola at 07:22 AM | Comments (0)