India will soon be a robust player in the intra-Asian trading system, which it hasn?t been thus far. The country will outsource to other countries like Philippines and Singapore and this will, in turn, ensure the growth of a services trading system which India will be a part of, Sanjeev Sanyal, chief economist, South Asia and senior investment advisor, Deutsche Bank, said.
Speaking at a session on ?Building partnerships between India and Asia Pacific? chaired by The Express group editor in chief Shekhar Gupta, Sanyal pointed out that though India was opening up to the east considerably of late, it had not yet become part of the Asian trading system, chiefly because of its services oriented economy which, typically, did not lend itself to intra-Asian trade.
?Asians will get more aggressive as investors in the coming days, and Singapore will spearhead that,? Sanyal pointed out.
Anton Abugov, first vice-president and head of strategy and development at Russian giant Sistema said India was a clear strategic focus for Sistema. Underscoring Russia?s identity as an Asian economy, Abugov said his company had got a ?warm welcome? from the Indian authorities. ?We have already committed $1 billion over the past six months,? he said.
Making it clear that frequency allocation was an issue, which was engaging the minds of investors like Sistema on the telecoms side, he hoped the issue would be resolved soon. Sistema, which has a controlling stake in telecom company Shyam Telelink, Abugov said it was crucial for companies entering India to have an established local partner who would get things done initially.
Rajiv Jalota, the Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation CEO, said public private partnerships were being forged in the state, and some joint ventures MIDC had struck with foreign companies or private firms were yielding good results.