The UAE has committed investments of $100 billion in India in manufacturing, infrastructure and services, Piyush Goyal, commerce and industry minister said, and predicted that bilateral trade can go up to $250 billion by 2030 under the UAE-India Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement.
“The commitment from the UAE is to look at over $100 billion of investment to India in different sectors such as manufacturing, infrastructure, services,” Goyal said on Friday during the launch of ‘India-UAE start-up bridge’ in the presence of UAE’s Minister of Economy Abdulla bin Touq Al Marri at the UAE-IndiaEconomic Partnership Summit in Mumbai organised by the Confederation of Indian Industry.
The Indian minister said the comprehensive trade agreement between the two countries will help in creating huge job opportunities and boost growth of the domestic economy. The Cepa, which came into effect from May 1, is expected to increase the bilateral trade in goods to over $100 billion and trade in services to over $15 billion within five years.
The two-way trade has the potential to go up to $250 billion by 2030, Goyal added. “Clearly millions of jobs will be added if our exports which are now at about $36 billion grow as we are planning. And my own guess estimate is this partnership can finally go up to about $250 billion of bilateral trade on both sides.”
The ‘India-UAE start-up bridge’ is a one-stop platform to strengthen collaboration to promote startups through exchange of best practices between accelerators, incubators and other such ecosystem stakeholders.
There are a large number of startups that have emerged in the last six years, with more than 65,000 registered with the ministry. India also has over 100 unicorns with the third largest startup ecosystem in the world, Goyal said.
Minister Al Marri said the pact will add 1.7 per cent GDP growth to their economy. He also said the agreement is not just on products and commodities but also into services, adding that there are other opportunities that can come along.
Goyal noted in his speech that both countries are looking at education partnerships and that deeper energy cooperation and green hydrogen is going to be an area where both sides will work together.
The Indian minister said that the pact would not only open doors for Indian businesses to UAE but also to other countries as UAE is a transit point for large parts of Africa, Commonwealth of Independent States countries, and the Gulf region.
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